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IS/^v^^^,^;^,  ,\,v-:  fi^wSt  :.vi^T 


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V 


THE    LIFE   AND  TEACHINGS.^— -^-^ 


OF  JESUS 


SEP  25  1918 


/^ 


%i'>eiCAL  li^^^ 


s 


A    CRITICAL    ANALYSIS    OF    THE    SOURCES 

OF   THE    GOSPELS,   TOGETHER   WITH   A 

STUDY    OF    THE   SAYINGS  OF   JESUS 


y 


ARTHUR   KENYON  ROGERS 


G.  P.  PUTNAM'S  SONS 


NEW    YORK 
27   WEST  TWENTY-THIRD   STREET 


LONDON 

24   BEDFORD    STREET,  STRAND 


8t^e   ^nichtrbockcr  ^uss 
1894 


Copyright.  1894 

BY 

ARTHUR  KENYON  ROGERS 

Entered  at  Stationers'  Halt,  London 

By  G.  p.  PUTNAM'S  SONS 


Electrotyped,  Printed  nnd  Bound  l>y 

Ube  Iknicheibocfccr  prces,  'flew  IBorIt 
G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 


TO 

MY  FATHER  AND   MOTHER 


CONTENTS. 


Introduction 

fa/^t  i.— the  sources. 

CHAPTER 

I. — The  Synoptic  Gospels    . 
II. — The  Fourth  Gospel 
III. — The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels 


PAGE 

I 


22 
67 


PART  II.—  THE  LIFE  AND  TEA  CHINGS  OF  JESUS. 


I. — The  Preparation    .... 

II. — The  Kingdom  of  Heaven 
III. — The  Messiahship  of  Jesus    , 
IV. — ^Jesus'  Attitude  towards  the  Taw 

V. — ^Jesus'  Doctrine  of  God  and  Man 
VI. — The  Future  of  the  Kingdom 


187 
210 
229 
242 

259 

278 


VI 


Contents. 


CHAPTER 

VII. — The  Galilean  Ministry  . 
VIII. — The  Last  Days  of  Jesus     . 

IX. — The  Resurrection  of  Jesus 

Appendix 

Index  to  Passages  in  the  Gospels 


297 
312 
326 
337 
351 


THE    LIFE   AND  TEACHINGS 
OF  JESUS. 


INTRODUCTION. 

THE  discussions  about  religion  which  we  have  been 
familiar  with  in  recent  years  have  had  one  thing 
about  them  which,  if  it  is  not  new,  is  at  any 
rate  sufficiently  striking  to  deserve  that  a  particular 
emphasis  should  be  put  upon  it,  and  that  is  the  way 
in  which  the  discussion  has  been  taken  out  of  the 
hands  of  a  small  circle  of  professed  champions,  and  has 
become  a  topic  of  public  interest,  familiar  even  to  readers 
of  magazines  and  newspapers.  This  perhaps  has  not 
been  without  its  disadvantages,  for  the  controversies 
have  not  always  been  marked  by  soberness  or  by  very 
great  wisdom ;  and  yet  one  hardly  can  regret  a  fact 
which  shows  what  a  hold  religion  has  over  the  minds 
of  men,  and  in  how  real  a  manner  they  are  concerned 
about  it.  But  whatever  we  may  think  about  the  fact, 
it  has  shown  in  a  very  unmistakable  way,  what  religious 
teachers  are  still  sometimes  disposed  to  ignore,  that 
there  are  a  very  great  number  of  persons  who  are  no 
longer  content   to   take   their    religious   creeds   upon 


2  The  Life  and  Teachmgs  of  fesus. 

authority,  but  who  are  demanding  a  reason  for  what 
they  have  been  taught,  and  who  want  a  faith  which 
shall  harmonize  with  what  in  other  ways  they  are 
beginning  to  learn  about  the  universe. 

And  also,  to  one  who  is  willing  to  recognize  the 
facts,  popular  Christianity,  the  forms  of  Christianity 
which  our  churches  and  our  religious  newspapers  pre- 
dominatingly represent,  has  so  far  failed  to  satisfy  this 
demand,  and  it  does  not  seem  likely  that  it  will  be  able 
to  satisfy  it.  The  Church  has  insisted  upon  it  that  it 
had  a  religion  which  was  perfect,  a  religion  where  no 
changes  could  be  allowed  ;  and  it  therefore  cannot  be 
surprised  if  other  things  have  been  changing  and  have 
left  it  behind.  For  that  it  has  been  left  behind,  that 
no  longer  it  is  in  sympathy  with  what  is  most  charac- 
teristic in  modem  ways  of  thinking,  is  the  plainest  of 
facts,  whether  or  not  we  may  regret  that  this  is  so. 
The  break  between  science  and  religion  we  long  ago 
were  told  of,  aggressively  enough  on  both  sides ;  and 
every  day  it  seems  to  be  growing  harder  for  men  to 
read  and  think,  and  still  to  hold  to  beliefs  which  a 
hundred  years  ago  men  found  little  dilGSculty  in  hold- 
ing to.  Popular  religion,  it  is  true,  in  its  more  out- 
spoken representatives,  has  its  own  explanation  for 
this,  an  explanation  not  flattering  to  science  and 
culture ;  but  explainable  or  not,  for  all  eyes  the  fact  is 
there,  and  it  is  not  well  for  any  one  to  pass  too  lightly 
by  it.  For  while  truth  of  course  may  be  doubted,  and 
for  all  that  may  be  none  the  less  true,  yet  we  must  not 
forget  that  the  proper  business  of  truth  is  to  approve 
itself  to  us,  to  satisfy  us ;  and  whatever  steadily  and 
inevitably  gives  rise  to  doubt,  to  doubt  which  is  the 
greater  as  knowledge  becomes  greater,  and  which 
often  men  cannot  get  rid  of  unless  they  refuse  to  think 


Introduction. 


at  all,  we  may  hesitate  fairly  to  receive  as  truth. 
Christianity  has  claimed  it  as  a  chief  excellence,  that 
through  its  means  religion  is  no  longer  esoteric,  the 
possession  of  philosophers,  but  is  brought  home  to  all 
men,  that  one  who  does  not  have  the  training  of  the 
schools  still  may  enjoy  the  benefits  which  it  confers ; 
and  it  has  done  quite  right  to  insist  upon  this.  But 
when  religion  becomes,  not  something  where  the  wise 
man  and  the  ignorant  stand  upon  terms  which  are 
fairly  equal,  but  where  the  wise  man  is  at  a  disadvan- 
tage, something  which  is  less  easily  to  be  accepted  by 
the  thinker  than  by  the  one  who  cannot  or  who  will 
not  think  at  all,  then  the  mistake  is  just  as  fatal  as  the 
old  mistake  of  making  salvation  depend  upon  phi- 
losophy, and  such  a  religion  cannot  long  continue. 

To  religion  itself,  fortunately,  there  seems  to  be  but 
little  danger.  Religion,  of  some  sort  or  other,  there 
appears  no  likelihood  that  men  will  be  content  to  do 
without,  if  it  be  nothing  more  than  M.  Kenan's  playing 
at  religion .  But  whether  this  is  likely  to  be  the  Christian 
religion,  the  religion  of  the  Bible,  there  is  more  reason 
perhaps  to  be  in  doubt.  Certainly,  those  who  tell  us 
that  the  Christian  religion  must  now  be  set  aside  are 
fairly  numerous,  and  they  are  not  lacking  at  all  in 
positiveness  ;  if  they  only  might  agree  better  as  to  what 
is  to  take  its  place,  we  should  listen  to  them,  perhaps, 
more  hopefully.  For  myself,  I  confess  I  do  not  believe 
that  the  religion  of  the  Bible  is  yet  to  be  put  aside  ; 
rather  does  it  seem  to  me  that  more  and  more  men  are 
likely  to  come  back  to  it,  and  to  rest  upon  it.  For, 
for  one  thing,  however  skilfully  our  new  religions  have 
been  framed  and  adapted  to  meet  the  needs  of  a  univer- 
sal religion,  a  religion  of  mankind,  mankind  in  general 
has  steadily  refused  to  see  their  superiority,  and  has 


4  TJic  Life  and  TeacJiings  of  Jesus. 

found  them  exceedingly  comfortless  and  iinsatisfj'ing. 
This  the  author  of  the  religion  no  doubt  finds  explicable 
enough.  To  know  truth,  he  will  say,  requires  a  cer- 
tain amount  of  preparation,  of  culture,  and  most  of  all 
it  requires  a  clear  vision  and  a  freedom  from  prejudice  ; 
and  these  qualifications  the  mass  of  men  do  not  possess, 
notoriously  they  are  under  the  control  of  priest-craft 
and  of  superstition.  But  after  all  the  matter  is  not  to 
be  so  easily  explained.  That  Christianity  for  some 
eighteen  hundred  years  now  has  had  the  power  to 
arouse  a  boundless  love  in  multitudes  of  men,  shows 
very  plainly  that  a  real  truth,  and  a  very  essential 
truth,  does  indeed  lie  wrapped  up  in  it.  Superstition, 
mistaken  enthusiasm,  does  not  act  in  this  way,  it  does 
not  hold  men  as  Christianity  holds  them,  it  does  not 
work  upon  them  as  Christianity  has  done  to  make  them 
in  a  surprising  way  purer  and  better  men,  a  test  which 
is,  after  all,  not  the  worst  one  that  could  be  applied. 
That  the  Christian  religion,  too,  has  succeeded  best  in 
bringing  joy  to  men,  in  bringing  them  peace  and  satis- 
faction, this  also  is  not  to  be  lightly  thought  of.  Now 
just  in  this  lies  the  one  evidence  for  the  Christian  reli- 
gion which  cannot  be  shaken,  the  evidence  that  rests 
upon  experience.  That  men  have  been  made  better, 
and  the  needs  which  they  feel  to  be  their  deepest  needs 
have  been  satisfied,  that  somehow  or  other  this  has 
come  to  them  through  the  Bible,  however  we  may  ex- 
plain this  we  cannot  explain  it  away.  But  upon  this 
fact  men  have  not  been  content  to  rest ;  they  have  made 
the  explanation  of  it  more  important  than  the  fact  itself, 
and  they  have  even  made  the  fact  depend  upon  the  ex- 
planation. The  Christian,  on  his  side,  has  his  creed, 
his  elaborate  theory  of  the  Bible,  and  upon  the  cer- 
tainty of  this  theory  he  hotly  maintains  that  the  cer- 


Introduction. 


tainty  of  his  experience  must  depend.  The  unbeliever 
is  quite  ready  to  meet  him  half  way,  and  he  demon- 
strates eagerly  that  the  theory  is  all  wrong,  and  so  the 
experience  ought  not  to  exist  at  all.  But  then  the  ex- 
perience does  exist,  it  stands  as  a  fact ;  and  to  show 
that  any  number  of  explanations  may  be  questionable 
explanations  does  not  change  the  fact  in  the  slightest. 
This  then  is  the  important  thing  about  the  Bible,  the 
benefit  which  actually  it  may  be  the  means  of  bringing 
to  us.  To  criticise  the  Bible,  to  find  out  when  and 
how  it  was  written,  and  what  is  the  truth  about  the 
matters  of  history  which  it  deals  with,  however  im- 
portant this  may  be,  is  still  a  matter  of  secondary 
importance ;  and  when  criticism  stops  at  this,  and 
thinks  that  by  explaining  this  it  has  explained  every- 
thing, it  is  of  very  little  importance  indeed.  So  far  as 
religion  is  concerned,  one  might  even  prefer  to  have 
nothing  to  do  with  criticism  at  all,  to  let  questions  of 
date  and  authorship  look  after  themselves ;  but  to 
many  people  this  is  no  longer  possible,  and  that  it  is 
no  longer  possible  the  Church  has  itself  largely  to 
blame.  The  Church  has  not  been  content  to  insist 
upon  the  many  things  in  the  Bible  which  are  undeni- 
ably true  and  beautiful,  but  it  must  needs  surround 
the  Bible  with  a  rigid  theory  about  it,  it  must  warn 
people  to  accept  the  whole  Bible  without  demur,  as 
the  Church  accepted  it,  or  else  to  let  the  Bible  quite 
alone.  To  show  that  these  theories  cannot  be  true,  to 
show  that  this  or  that  belief  about  the  Bible  can  no 
longer  be  accepted,  is  not  the  highest  work  or  the 
most  important,  but  this  is  the  first  thing  that  has  to 
be  done.  Such  work  is  destructive,  and  one  could 
wish  it  did  not  need  doing  at  all ;  done  at  its  best  it 
dissatisfies  us  somewhat.     Such  a  work  was  that  of 


6  TJlc  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus, 

Strauss  in  his  famous  Life  of  Jesus,  a  book  almost  to  be 
regretted,  in  spite  of  all  its  great  merits.  But,  neverthe- 
less, it  is  one  of  the  objects  of  this  work  to  show  that, 
after  all  that  an  unsparing  criticism  can  say,  the  re- 
ligious value  of  the  Bible  still  remains,  and  that  it 
speaks  to  the  present  generation  with  a  power  which, 
under  the  old  conceptions,  it  could  never  hope  to  have. 
As  for  the  results  in  Bible  criticism  which  so  far 
have  been  established  by  scholars,  especially  by  the 
German  scholars,  I  am  not  disposed  to  make  too 
sweeping  claims.  But  one  thing  at  any  rate  criticism 
has  established,  for  which,  with  all  its  failures,  we 
should  be  very  grateful  to  it,  and  that  is  the  claim  of 
the  writings  which  make  up  the  Bible  to  be  treated  as 
literature,  as  historical  documents.  Very  much  of  our 
English  and  American  criticism  has  failed  to  have  any 
influence,  and  must  of  necessity  fail,  because  it  is  not 
willing  to  recognize  this  fact ;  it  is  a  criticism  which  is 
still  busying  itself  about  theories  of  verbal  inspiration, 
and  which  still  hopes  that  it  may  be  able  to  remove  all 
inconsistencies  from  the  Bible.  No  one  who  under- 
stands the  spirit  of  these  endeavors  will  have  any  de- 
sire to  ridicule  them  ;  but  we  must  insist  that  they  are 
hopeless,  and,  besides  being  hopeless,  that  they  are  do- 
ing a  great  deal  to  destroy  the  credit  of  the  Bible  itself. 
Such  conceptions  as  these  it  will  not  be  possible  for  me 
to  argue  against  in  detail  ;  to  this  end  Mr.  Ingersoll 
has  been  raised  up,  and  Mr.  Ingersoll  we  may  safely 
leave  with  those  who  are  interested  in  his  writings,  to 
settle  matters  among  themselves.  Nor  is  argument, 
however  clear  and  logical  it  may  be,  likely  t?o  have 
very  much  influence  in  convincing  any  one,  for  of  argu- 
ment there  never  has  been  any  lack.  So  long  as  men 
look  at  the  Bible  as  a  book  direct  from  heaven,  no 


Introduction. 


evidence  that  can  be  brought  forward  on  the  other 
side  will  ever  be  strong  enough  to  outweigh  its  testi- 
mony. But  we  are  coming  to  see  that  it  is  not  possible 
to  look  upon  the  Bible  as  a  book  direct  from  heaven, 
we  are  finding  out  that  the  Bible  is  only  one  sacred 
book  among  many,  and  that  it  is  not  the  Christian 
only  who  has  his  doctrine  of  infallibility.  And  if 
those  to  whom  the  narratives  of  the  Bible  are  so  sacred 
that  they  are  not  to  be  handled  freely  as  other  narra- 
tives are  handled,  could  for  just  one  moment  stand 
aside  from  their  own  point  of  view,  and  could  realize 
that  criticism,  if  it  is  honest  criticism,  must  begin  by 
looking  upon  the  Bible  just  as  they  themselves  look 
upon  other  sacred  books,  as  something  to  be  tested 
just  as  other  books  are  tested,  at  least  some  of  the 
bitterness  of  controversy  would  be  done  away. 

There  is  the  more  need  to  speak  plainly  and  sharply 
in  this  matter,  because  many  of  our  religious  leaders 
are  disposed  to  admit  the  principle,  while  they  are  not 
willing  to  apply  it.  The  Bible,  they  say,  may  contain 
errors.  But  that  any  particular  statement  is  an  error, 
they  will  not  admit  so  long  as  there  is  any  way,  prob- 
able or  improbable,  in  which  it  may  be  explained. 
Now  this  is  not  consistent,  and  it  is  not  quite  honest ; 
it  is  pretending  to  treat  the  Bible  in  an  impartial  way, 
without  treating  it  in  a  way  that  is  actually  impartial. 
When  we  are  dealing  with  any  other  book  we  do  not 
assume  that  its  statements  are  true  so  long  as  there  is 
any  conceivable  way  in  which  they  might  be  true  ;  we 
balance  the  evidence,  and  then  we  decide  for  the  more 
probable  view.  And  we  must  insist  that  the  state- 
ments of  the  Bible  are  to  be  accepted  or  rejected  on 
just  the  same  degree  of  probability  or  improbability 
which  would  govern  us  anywhere  else. 


8  TJic  Life  and  TcackiuQS  of  Jesus. 

We  have  had  no  lack  of  discussion  in  recent  years 
as  to  just  what  inspiration  is,  and  how  much  ground  it 
covers.  Such  discussions,  one  cannot  help  thinking, 
are  to  no  very  great  profit.  One  who  holds  that  the 
Bible  is  wholly  without  error  is  at  the  least  consistent  ; 
but  if  we  admit  but  one  error,  however  slight  that  error 
may  be,  we  really  have  no  right  to  stop  half  way.  For 
if  error  is  possible,  then  any  particular  statement  may 
be  in  error,  and  there  is  nothing  left  for  it  but  to  test 
each  statement  upon  its  own  merits.  No  more  have 
we  the  right,  while  w^e  hand  over  the  history  to  criti- 
cism, to  retain  our  claim  of  infallibility  for  the  religious 
teaching.  For,  apart  from  the  fact  that  we  very  often 
cannot  separate  the  two,  it  is  just  in  the  religious 
teaching  that  we  meet  with  some  of  the  greatest  difii- 
culties.  Let  us  take  such  a  story  as  that  which  is 
given  in  the  twenty-first  chapter  of  Second  Samuel : 
Jehovah  sends  a  famine  upon  the  land  because,  some 
years  before,  Saul  had  slain  the  Gibeonites  ;  the  seven 
sons  of  Saul  are  put  to  death,  and  Jehovah  is  appeased. 
Let  us  apply  our  test  to  it ;  what  should  we  have  said 
if  we  had  met  with  this  story  in  any  other  book  ?  With- 
out hesitation  we  should  have  said  that  it  was  barbar- 
ous and  superstitious,  a  wholly  unworthy  notion  of 
God.  Then  with  no  less  hesitation  let  us  say  the  same 
thing  when  it  is  in  the  Bible  that  we  find  it.  So,  too, 
in  the  New  Testament  we  find  the  whole  Church  be- 
lieving in  a  second  coming  of  Christ,  which  should 
take  place  within  a  few  years.  This  is  a  belief  which 
is  distinctly  a  religious  belief,  and  yet  for  all  that  it  was 
a  mistaken  belief,  and  we  have  to  admit  that  it  was 
mistaken. 

If  then  we  will  make  up  our  minds  that  God  has  not 
seen  fit  to  give  men  a  book  which  will  save  them  the 


Introdtiction. 


trouble  of  doing  their  religious  thinking  for  themselves, 
we  shall  find  that  we  have  left  a  theory  of  inspiration, 
which  may  not  settle  all  our  questions  in  so  short  and 
easy  a  fashion,  but  which  at  least  has  the  advantage 
that  it  is  something  which  can  be  verified.  None  of 
us,  if  we  had  lived  in  the  days  of  Isaiah  or  of  Paul, 
would,  it  is  likely,  have  been  willing  to  submit  to  Isaiah 
or  to  Paul,  as  to  infallible  guides,  who  could  make  no 
mistake  in  their  teaching,  any  more  than,  in  our  own 
day,  we  should  have  been  willing  to  submit  to  Mr. 
Arnold  or  Mr.  Spurgeon.  And  the  mere  use  of  pen 
and  ink  surely  gives  no  stamp  of  infallibility  to  any 
man's  beliefs.  But  any  one  of  us  might  have  been 
glad  to  recognize  in  Isaiah  or  in  Paul  a  man  to  whom 
had  been  granted  a  new  insight  into  religious  truth, 
truth  which  we  accepted,  not  because  it  came  from 
Isaiah  or  from  Paul,  but  because  it  bore  in  itself  the 
testimony  to  its  own  truthfulness.  And  in  the  Bible 
this  is  just  what  we  have,  we  have  the  words,  coming 
to  us  directly  or  through  other  men,  of  those  who  have 
been  the  world's  greatest  religious  teachers  ;  only  here 
we  do  not  have  them  by  word  of  mouth,  but  in  the 
form  of  literature,  of  many  different  books.  These 
books  were  called  forth  just  as  sermons  and  essays  and 
histories  are  called  forth  now.  In  the  same  way  they 
represent  the  convictions  of  the  authors.  But  for  just 
the  reason  that  we  do  not  believe  there  have  lived  in 
the  world  some  thirty-five  or  forty  men  whose  opinions 
on  history  and  science  and  religion  have  been  infallibly 
true,  for  just  this  reason  we  do  not  believe  the  books 
they  have  written  are  infallibly  true.  Just  what  is  true 
and  what  is  not  true  we  have  to  determine  exactly  as 
we  should  determine  it  in  the  books  of  Mr.  Arnold  and 
Mr.  Spurgeon.      The  statements  of  history  and  of 


lo        The  Life  and  Teachings  of  fesus. 

science  we  have  to  judge  by  the  rules  which  govern 
historical  and  scientific  criticism  ;  the  religious  truths 
we  must  judge  by  their  own  inherent  reasonableness. 

And  coming  to  the  Bible  in  this  way,  treating  it  as 
we  should  treat  any  other  book,  it  will  not  escape  us 
that  it  is  just  in  the  matter  of  the  miraculous  that  the 
case  for  the  Bible  is  the  weakest.  For  in  other  books 
it  is  precisely  this  supernatural  element  which  we  treat 
with  the  least  hesitation  ;  when  we  meet  with  miracles 
we  do  not  ask  any  one  to  prove  to  us  that  they  are  not 
true,  we  simply  assume  that  they  are  not  true.  We 
may  ask  what  foundation  lies  at  the  bottom  of  them, 
but  even  when  there  is  no  such  foundation  that  we  can 
come  at,  we  are  none  the  less  sure  that  it  is  only  with 
natural  events  that  we  have  to  do. 

Now  that  this  method  men  should  hesitate  to  apply 
rigorously  when  they  come  to  the  Bible  miracles,  to 
the  Gospel  miracles  most  of  all,  one  may  not  find  very 
surprising.  For  the  Gospel  miracles  there  are  many 
things  to  be  said  which  one  cannot  say  for  other  mir- 
acles, and  upon  the  Gospel  miracles,  too,  vastly  more 
depends.  But  still  men  have  been  far  too  eager  to 
establish  their  importance,  and  they  have  made  much 
to  depend  upon  them  which  really  does  not  depend 
upon  them  at  all.  For  the  divine  character  of  the 
Christian  religion  may  stand,  quite  apart  from  the 
question  of  any  miracles  that  are  connected  with  it, 
and  one  may  quite  consistently  hold  to  the  one  while 
he  lets  the  other  go.  A  miracle,  we  may  say,  defined 
in  simple  terms,  is  something  which  the  working  of 
natural  and  every  day  laws  could  not  bring  about, 
which  is  not  the  result  of  an  orderly  extension  and 
development  of  forces  with  which  we  are  acquainted, 
but  an  interruption  of  this  development,  whose  value 


Introduction.  1 1 


lies  just  in  the  fact  that  it  is  not  permanent,  not  some- 
thing that  we  are  used  to, — putting  aside  philosophical 
refinements,  this  is  what  naturally  we  mean.  Now  so 
soon  as  one  recognizes  what  a  miracle  is,  he  will  see 
that  to  deny  miracles  is  not  at  all  to  deny  the  presence 
of  God,  to  deny  the  supernatural.  Indeed  one  might 
fairly  say  to  the  arguer  for  miracles.  When  you  insist 
upon  the  miraculous,  you  are  neglecting  the  very  thing 
which  points  most  clearly  to  the  supernatural.  It  is 
just  in  the  fact  of  law,  of  orderly  development,  of  the 
absence  of  what  is  simply  disconnected  and  arbitrary, 
that  men  to-day  are  inclined  to  see  the  presence  of  God 
most  clearly.  The  indications  of  a  goal  to  which  the 
universe  is  tending,  and  which  was  wrapped  up  in  its 
very  beginnings,  the  slow  and  steady  progress  from 
the  simple  to  the  complex  along  definite  lines,  the  evi- 
dence of  a  purpose  in  the  long  stretch  of  material 
evolution  and  human  history,  this  is  where  men  now 
are  looking  to  see  God's  hand  at  work.  And  it  is 
because  the  Christian  religion  does  not  interrupt  this 
development,  but  falls  in  naturally  with  it,  because  we 
see  a  religion  slowly  unfolding  till  it  should  be  fit  to 
become  a  world  religion,  because  we  see  righteousness 
working  itself  out  in  an  extraordinary  nation  and  an 
extraordinary  life,  and  then  extending  itself  to  raise 
the  rest  of  the  world  to  the  same  level,  that  we  call 
that  religion  and  that  life  divine.  But  you  do  not 
think  that  such  proof  is  enough  ;  in  law,  it  is  true,  you 
do  find  a  revelation  of  God,  and  you  insist  upon  it,  but 
in  his  highest  revelation  you  think  that  he  has  given 
up  this  proof  and  has  gone  over  to  the  other  side,  that 
he  revealed  himself  in  law,  and  then  he  revealed  him- 
self by  breaking  his  law.  And  when  you  blame  us, 
one  might  still  go  on  to  say,  because  in  denying  mir- 


12         The  Life  and  TcacJiings  of  Jesus. 

acles  we  show  a  lack  of  faith  in  God,  we  might  reply 
that  this  may  be  a  matter  of  opinion.  For  to  see  a 
revelation  of  God  in  the  Christian  religion  because  it  is 
reasonable,  because  it  is  worthy  of  God  and  in  harmony 
with  the  other  revelations  that  he  has  made,  this  also, 
we  think,  is  faith  after  a  sort,  and  perhaps  as  accept- 
able as  a  faith  in  miracles.  For  a  miracle  after  all 
proves  very  little  indeed,  and  strictly  it  has  nothing  to 
do  at  all  with  what  is  the  real  object  of  faith.  A  mir- 
acle only  shows  that  the  one  who  performs  it  has  a 
certain  power  over  physical  things,  and  it  does  not 
prove  in  the  least  that  his  words  are  true,  though 
naturall)'  enough  we  are  more  ready  to  accept  them  as 
true.  We  might  conceive  certainly  that  God  could  not 
warrant  his  truth  to  us  except  hy  giving  us  a  sample 
of  what  he  can  do,  by  showing  us  how  powerful  he  is  ; 
but  it  would  be  quite  as  worthy  of  God,  we  think,  if 
the  truth  had  in  it  the  power  to  attest  itself.  Indeed 
the  greatest  weakness  of  your  argument  appears  in 
what  you  yourselves  admit.  You  will  not  treat  fairly, 
you  say  to  us,  the  evidence  for  miracles  ;  you  assume  to 
begin  with  that  they  are  not  true,  you  let  your  natiu-al 
objection  to  them  influence  your  judgment.  To  you 
this  seems  to  be  a  serious  fault,  perhaps  a  moral  fault, 
but  to  us  what  you  say  appears  to  overthrow  your  own 
position.  That  there  is  a  natural  objection  to  miracles 
which  makes  them  not  easily  to  be  believed,  that  everj- 
day  it  is  growing  harder  and  harder  to  believe  them, 
and  that  they  cannot  be  received  except  on  the  firmest 
and  surest  evidence,  you  yourselves  will  be  ready  to 
admit.  But  miracles  are  only  valuable  for  the  proof 
they  furnish  ;  in  themselves  they  have  for  the  most 
part  no  value  at  all.  So  that  you  are  insisting  that  the 
Christian  religion  is  to  be  proved  by  the  very  things 


Introduction.  1 3 


which  themselves  are  most  in  need  of  proof ;  you  tell 
us  that  the  proof  of  God  rests  upon  the  miraculous,  and 
then  you  blame  us  because  we  have  not  faith  enough 
in  God  to  believe  the  miracles.  It  does  not  seem  to  us 
that  for  God  to  place  men  in  a  world  where,  after  they 
came  to  know  it,  a  distrust  of  miracles  would  become 
inevitable,  and  then  to  base  the  proof  of  his  revelation 
to  them  upon  this  very  thing,  would  be  either  fair  or 
likely  ;  and  the  fact  that  we  find  it  natural  to  suspect 
the  miraculous,  shows,  we  think,  that  miracles  do  not 
happen. 

For  most  people,  doubtless,  there  will  still  be  reasons 
which  will  keep  them  wholly  from  giving  the  miracles 
up,  and  most  of  all  they  will  fear  that  they  are  detract- 
ing from  the  greatness  of  Jesus  himself.  The  fear  is  a 
natural  one,  and  it  is  not  lightly  to  be  disregarded; 
but  seriously  we  may  ask  ourselves  whether  the  honor 
we  have  paid  to  Jesus  has  not  been  of  a  very  doubtful 
sort  after  all,  whether  it  has  not  been  more  a  seeming 
honor  than  a  real  one.  In  our  theologies,  no  doubt, 
and  in  our  creeds,  we  have  made  much  of  him,  but  it 
has  been  the  glory  of  a  doctrine  rather  than  the  glory 
of  a  person,  and  of  the  real  Jesus  we  have  had  far  too 
little.  And  to  the  real  Jesus  we  now  must  come,  for 
the  world  no  longer  can  content  itself  with  a  mock- 
man  ;  full  and  true  humanity  it  must  have  first  of  all. 
How  are  men  who  must  walk  by  faith  to  be  helped  by 
one  who  walked  by  sight,  men  who  must  fight  their 
way  through  doubts  and  perplexities,  by  one  who 
remembers  a  former  life  in  heaven,  who  is  omniscient 
and  all-powerful  ?  Such  a  view  as  this  does  not  honor 
Jesus,  but  by  making  easy  and  necessary  for  him  what 
for  other  men  is  hard,  it  makes  it  impossible  that  he 
should  attain  that  which  is  a  man's  highest  achieve- 


14         TJie  Life  and  Teachings  of  fesus. 

ment,  it  takes  away  from  him  the  blessedness  of  those 
who  have  not  seen  and  yet  have  believed.  The  truth 
is,  that  if  Jesus  is  to  hold  his  old  position,  he  must 
needs  be  rid  first  of  the  incubus  of  the  sensuous  and 
magical  conceptions  of  religion  with  which  he  has  been 
weighted.  For  these  beliefs  the  foundations  are  rapidly 
crumbling  away,  and  not  even  the  authority  of  Jesus 
can  hold  them  up  much  longer.  Now,  no  one  who 
has  once  submitted  to  the  charm  of  Jesus'  influence  and 
has  felt  the  immense  power  of  his  personality^  can  for 
a  moment  doubt  that  his  position  will  be  vindicated  in 
the  end  ;  nevertheless  it  is  not  so  easy  to  give  the  proofs 
for  one's  faith,  and  to  show  just  how  the  growth  of 
legend  which  has  gathered  about  the  real  Jesus  and 
obscured  his  features  is  to  be  stripped  away.  It  is  this 
that  I  have  made  the  attempt  to  do.  I  have  not  tried 
at  all  to  treat  questions  of  scholarship,  except  those 
necessary  for  my  purpose,  in  an  exhaustive  way,  nor 
to  give  a  picture  of  the  times  in  which  Jesus  lived. 
This  already  has  been  done  much  better  than  I  could 
do  it.  Nor  have  I  had  any  special  desire  to  make  a 
vivid  narrative  out  of  hazardous  conjectures.  What  I 
have  had  in  mind  particularly  to  do  was  to  bring  the 
results  of  a  careful  criticism  of  the  Gospels  to  bear  upon 
the  words  attributed  to  Jesus,  and  to  bring  together 
into  a  consistent  picture  whatever  the  test  may  have 
left  untouched.  The  beauty  and  the  grandeur  of  this 
picture  as  it  exists  in  my  own  mind  I  fear  I  have  not 
been  able  to  reproduce,  but  at  least  I  trust  I  have  re- 
moved some  of  the  hindrances  to  each  man's  seeing 
that  beauty  for  himself. 

I  know  that  there  are  many  to  whom  this  book,  if 
they  ever  happen  to  read  it,  will  seem  to  be  only  an 
attack  on  what  they  hold  as  sacred.     I  shall  be  sorry 


Introdtiction.  1 5 


if  this  is  so,  but  I  do  not  see  how  it  can  well  be  helped. 
I  have  tried  to  let  the  facts  make  their  own  impression 
upon  me,  and  I  can  do  no  better  than  to  tell  frankly 
what  that  impression  is.  And  in  the  end  I  feel  sure  this 
will  prove  the  truest  method.  Enough  compromise  in 
religious  matters  we  have  had  already.  If  the  scalpel 
does  not  go  deep  enough,  the  pain  has  been  of  no  avail 
and  the  operation  might  as  well  never  have  been  per- 
formed. I  cannot  feel  surprised,  however,  that  men 
should  want  to  keep  their  own  beliefs,  and  should  not 
like  to  see  them  treated  too  roughly  ;  and  I  believe  that 
the  spirit  which  prompts  this  deserves  all  consideration. 
Our  liberal  writers  of  late  years  have  made  us  tolerably 
familiar  with  the  idea,  no  doubt  startling  enough  in  its 
time,  that  belief,  after  all,  is  not  of  very  much  account 
in  religion,  and  that  we  may  be  satisfied  if  we  can 
acquit  ourselves  fairly  in  the  matter  of  conduct.  Why, 
they  are  accustomed  to  say,  should  we  trouble  ourselves 
about  creeds  and  articles  of  faith  ?  I^et  us  stop  preach- 
ing doctrines,  and  let  us  go  to  preaching  practical 
duties  ;  it  makes  but  little  difference  what  a  man  be- 
lieves so  long  as  his  life  is  right.  Our  knowledge  at 
the  best  is  fragmentary  and  uncertain  ;  let  us  recog- 
nize this,  and  let  us  not  try  to  force  it  upon  other  men 
besides.  And  up  to  a  certain  point  at  least,  as  a  pro- 
test against  dogmatism,  this  idea  is  true  and  admirable 
enough.  Certainly  we  ought  not  to  lose  sight  of  our 
own  fallibility  ;  humility  is  an  intellectual  virtue  which 
might  with  profit  be  cultivated  more  carefully,  even 
among  liberal  thinkers.  Still  one  cannot  help  feeling 
that  creeds  have  been  dismissed  in  somewhat  too  con- 
temptuous a  way  ;  one  hardly  likes  to  treat  his  beliefs 
in  so  cavalier  a  fashion.  It  is  true,  no  doubt,  that  my 
conceptions  of  truth  are  far  from  being  perfect ;  but 


1 6         The  Life  and  Teachmgs  of  yeszis. 


then  they  are  all  I  have,  and  I  cannot  be  wholly  indif- 
ferent to  them.  One  must  protest  against  making 
tolerance  simply  indifference  about  one's  beliefs  ;  what- 
ever it  may  be  or  may  not  be,  it  surely  is  not  this.  The 
conviction  that  the  truth  which  I  see,  others  will  come 
to  see  besides,  the  desire  that  this  should  be  so,  surely 
this  is  not  something  that  one  could  wish  to  see  driven 
out  of  the  world.  It  goes  hard  if  one  may  not  be  sure 
that  the  truth  will  conquer  in  the  end  ;  and,  with  all 
readiness  to  be  corrected,  what  can  I  know  of  truth  be- 
yond what  seems  true  to  me,  my  belief  and  creed  ?  This 
at  least  is  what  the  most  of  us  act  upon,  nor  do  I  know 
that  it  is  much  worse  to  anathematize  my  neighbor 
because  he  does  not  accept  my  creed,  than  it  is  to  abuse 
him  because  he  declines  to  do  without  a  creed  alto- 
gether. Tolerance,  therefore,  one  may  say  again, 
whatever  it  may  be,  is  not  indifference  about  belief.  It 
is  not  true  that  what  a  man  believes  makes  no  differ- 
ence with  him  ;  it  may  possibly  make  a  great  differ- 
ence, and  usually  it  does  make  a  difference  of  some 
sort.  If  there  is  any  such  thing  as  truth  at  all,  one 
certainly  must  wish  for  men  to  know  it. 

And  yet  for  all  that,  tolerance  in  religion  is  certainly 
a  good  thing,  and  one  is  rather  concerned  to  know  in 
how  far  tolerance  and  zeal  may  go  together.  We  are 
often  told  that  ours  is  a  tolerant  age.  I  do  not  know ; 
perhaps  it  is  true.  But  one  cannot  help  thinking  that 
what  tolerance  the  Church  possesses,  it  has  gained  some- 
what at  the  expense  of  its  logic.  What  right,  indeed, 
has  the  Church  to  be  tolerant  ?  If  a  man's  salvation 
depends  upon  his  accepting  certain  beliefs,  can  there 
be  any  freedom  of  thought  which  is  not  really  license  ? 
Questionings,  doubts,  these  belong  where  truth  is  un- 
certain ;  here  it  is  only  to  be  accepted,  and  every  devi- 


Introduction.  1 7 


ation  from  it  is  dangerous.  I  do  not  think,  however, 
that  the  Church  has  been  wrong  in  growing  more  toler- 
ant in  recent  years  ;  on  the  contrary,  it  has  been  quite 
right  in  doing  this,  and  the  mistake  lies  wholly  in  its 
logic.  The  Church  has  not  been  wrong  in  making 
much  of  doctrines,  but  it  has  been  fatally  wrong  in  con- 
necting doctrines  with  salvation.  If  it  had  followed 
Jesus  it  never  would  have  done  this  ;  but  Jesus'  view 
unfortunately  was  too  simple  to  satisfy  the  ingenuity 
of  his  followers,  who  were  for  having  a  philosophy,  a 
theology,  that  should  speak  with  authority  :  and 
whereas  Jesus  had  thought  of  salvation  as  character, 
as  the  growth  of  a  man  into  the  divine  life,  the  theo- 
logians came  to  look  upon  the  other  side  of  it ;  they 
were  anxious  to  escape  from  the  punishment  of  their 
sins,  and  they  called  this  salvation.  And  looking  at 
salvation  in  this  way,  it  was  inevitable  that  they  should 
make  belief  the  starting-point  for  it ;  it  is  only  when  we 
get  back  to  Jesus'  view  that  the  matter  of  belief  will 
adjust  itself.  No  man  at  any  definite  time  can  say 
what  his  beliefs  shall  be.  He  only  can  seek  out  the 
evidence,  and  then  let  his  beliefs  shape  themselves  as 
they  will ;  how  they  shape  themselves  will  depend  upon 
very  many  things  which  are  outside  himself.  But  a 
man  can  always  say  that  he  will  recognize  what  is 
honorable  and  just,  that  he  will  follow  this  as  truly  as 
he  can,  and  model  his  life  upon  it ;  and  by  doing  this 
he  is  following  the  directions  of  Jesus,  and  the  only 
directions  which  Jesus  gave.  This  is  not  to  say  that 
belief  is  not  a  part  of  salvation,  or  that  a  man  is  all 
that  he  is  capable  of  becoming,  so  long  as  what  he  be- 
lieves is  not  in  harmony  with  reality.  Not  this  at  all ; 
but  belief  cannot  be  manufactured  to  order,  and  it  is 
something  which  very  often  must  come  at  the  end 


1 8         The  Life  and  TeacJmigs  of  Jesus. 

rather  than  at  the  beginning,  which  is  not  the  cause  of 
salvation  so  much  as  it  is  the  result  of  it.  The  Church, 
on  the  contrar}^  has  wished  to  force  a  theology  on 
every  one  from  the  outset ;  it  has  not  recognized  that 
belief  is  a  growth  just  as  character  is  a  growth,  that 
the  accepting  of  truth  in  such  liberal  quantities  renders 
it  impossible  to  assimilate  it  and  make  it  a  part  of  our- 
selves, that  such  an  acceptance  is  not  believing,  but 
only  saying  that  we  believe.  And  the  course  which 
this  has  led  to  is  so  manifestly  unwise  that  one  would 
think  even  the  Church  might  have  seen  its  lack  of 
wisdom.  A  young  man  is  beginning  to  think  for  him- 
self, and  he  is  overwhelmed  by  doubts  and  contradic- 
tions. What  now  shall  the  Church  say  to  him  ?  shall 
it  say,  Hold  fast  to  your  belief  in  goodness,  live  up  to 
all  the  faith  that  is  in  you  ;  and  that  you  may  do  this 
the  better,  come  in  with  us,  and  whether  you  can  be- 
lieve in  God  and  the  future,  or  not,  we  will  help  you 
andsympathizewith5^ourdifl&culties, — this  surely  might 
have  something  in  its  favor.  But  no,  it  does  nothing  of 
the  sort ;  it  says  to  him.  We  can  have  no  fellowship  with 
you.  Go  and  have  your  struggle  out  by  yourself,  and 
then,  if  you  find  that  you  can  agree  with  us,  come  back 
and  we  will  let  you  in. 

It  is  just  here  that  the  fault  lies  in  most  of  the  dis- 
cussions we  are  having  on  the  question  of  Church  union; 
men  are  assuming  all  the  while  that  the  Church,  in  one 
way  or  another,  must  be  founded  upon  belief.  Some 
writers  will  have  us  settle  upon  the  Bible  as  a  basis  of 
union,  as  if  now  all  sects  alike  did  not  appeal  to  the 
Bible  as  their  authority,  and  as  if  a  common  Bible 
could  be  of  any  avail  without  a  common  principle  of 
interpretation.  If  we  must  wait  till  all  Christians  can 
agree  upon  a  creed,  I  fear  we  shall  have  long  to  wait ; 


Introduction.  1 9 


so  long  as  belief  at  all  is  held  to  be  essential,  men  will 
not  be  inclined  to  limit  the  number  of  their  beliefs,  and 
the  doctrine  that  has  been  strong  enough  to  form  a  sect 
will  not  readily  give  way  for  the  sake  of  unity.  But 
upon  one  thing  every  Christian  can  unite.  That  the 
ideal  of  character  which  Jesus  represents  is  the  true 
ideal,  that  for  the  realization  of  this  ideal  in  the  in- 
dividual and  in  the  nation  the  Church  is  founded,  this 
surel)'-  is  a  real  basis  of  union,  quite  as  strong  as  any 
compromise  about  articles  of  faith.  It  is  true  that  the 
Church  as  a  whole  will  stand  for  more  than  this,  and  it 
will  not  need  to  minimize  its  doctrines  ;  but  without 
doing  this,  it  still  can  give  to  the  doctrines  their  proper 
place.  Similarity  of  belief  still  might  determine  a 
man's  Church  associations,  and  yet  one  may  doubt 
whether  even  this  is  altogether  for  the  best,  whether 
the  association  of  those  who  look  at  truth  in  different 
ways  would  not  have  its  advantages.  We  have  the 
example  of  our  Unitarian  friends,  who,  with  a  great 
deal  that  is  excellent  in  their  creeds,  have  gone  off  by 
themselves, — one  cannot  help  thinking  they  have  lost 
something  in  spiritual  life.  Such  association  may  not 
indeed  have  been  possible  in  the  past,  and  it  may  not 
now  in  every  case  be  possible.  So  long  as  any  one  rests 
his  salvation  upon  his  doctrines  he  cannot  always  be 
courteous,  for  it  is  a  matter  of  life  and  death  with  him. 
But  if  once  we  can  give  up  this  idea  of  salvation,  one 
hardly  sees  why  we  may  not  come  to  a  discussion  even 
of  religious  truth  in  a  kindly  spirit  and  a  spirit  of  fel- 
lowship. This  most  of  all  is  what  we  need.  There  on 
the  one  side  is  the  liberal  Christian,  who  will  have  it 
that  Christianity  consists  to  a  considerable  extent  in 
not  being  Orthodox,  who  is  much  too  ready  to  show 
his  contempt  of  tradition,  and  who  appears  to  think  that 


20        The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

his  liberalism  is  a  necessary  proof  of  his  intellectual 
superiority  ;  and  there  is  the  conservative  Christian, 
who  is  inclined  to  suspect  the  motives  of  those  who  dis- 
agree with  him, — each  of  these,  it  may  be,  might  learn 
from  the  other,  if  only  they  could  be  brought  together. 
The  Church  has  come  to  a  crisis  in  its  history,  and 
whether  in  the  future  it  is  to  retain  the  influence  which 
it  has  had  in  the  past,  will  rest  very  largely  with  itself. 
I  have  confidence  that  it  will  not  fail  ;  there  are  many 
indications  which  show  that  already  it  is  beginning  to 
realize  that  it  has  new  opportunities  and  new  duties, 
that  it  is  working  under  conditions  which  are  fast 
changing.  The  theologians  who  are  willing  to  bring 
dogmas  to  the  test  of  history,  who  are  not  afraid  to  look 
facts  in  the  face,  and,  best  of  all,  who  are  coming  back 
more  and  more  to  Jesus,  and  trying  to  find  out  what  he 
really  stood  for,  are  constantly  becoming  more  numer- 
ous. But  they  still  are  far  too  few,  and  there  is  still 
very  much  that  the  Church  will  have  to  learn  ;  first  of 
all  it  must  learn  that  truth  is  sacred,  and  that  in  the 
search  for  truth  dogma  and  tradition  must  be  held  at 
their  proper  value.  It  has  talked  glibly  of  Strauss  and 
Wellhausen, of  atheism  and  rationalism,  let  it  now  try  to 
understand  what  it  has  been  talking  about,  let  it  ask 
itself  whether  the  opinions  which  it  deplores  could  have 
had  such  influence,  if  they  had  been  wholly  wrong  and 
the  Church  wholly  right,  let  it  be  less  concerned  to  dis- 
cover arguments  for  its  own  side  than  to  discover  truth. 
I  do  not  complain  that  the  Church  refuses  to  accept  new 
opinions,  I  complain  only  because  it  shows  little  incli- 
nation to  be  just  to  them,  and  because  it  is  too  ready  to 
resort  to  the  least  convincing  of  all  arguments,  mis- 
representation and  abuse.  It  is  not  well  that  the  Church 
should  change  at  once  its  old  creeds  ;  it  is  not  well  that 


Introditction. 


21 


those  who  are  satisfied  by  the  old  forms  of  truth  should 
be  made  to  exchange  them  for  new  ones.  But  those 
who  no  longer  find  that  the  old  forms  satisfy  their 
needs,  who  do  not  find  them  in  harmony  with  the  new 
light  that  has  come  from  science  and  philosophy,  these 
also  have  their  rights,  and  it  surely  is  well  that  these 
rights  should  be  respected. 


PART  /.—  THE  SO  URGES. 


CHAPTER  I. 

THK  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS. 

IF  we  are  to  obtain  any  secure  results  about  the  life 
of  Jesus,  it  will  be  necessary  first  to  make  a  careful 
examination  of  the  sources  which  furnish  the  facts 
relating  to  that  life,  and  in  particular  to  find  out  on 
whose  authority  they  come  to  us,  and  whether  we  have 
to  fall  back  on  the  words  of  men  who  really  had  the 
means  of  knowing  the  truth  about  the  matter.  And 
this  leads  at  once  to  the  problem  which  of  all  the  New 
Testament  problems  is  perhaps  the  most  perplexing, 
perplexing  because  the  answer  to  it  depends  upon  an 
immense  number  of  separate  points  which  themselves 
may  be  decided  in  altogether  dijBferent  ways,  and 
which  all  of  them  must  be  kept  in  mind,  and  be  placed 
side  by  side,  in  order  to  see  the  bearing  which  they 
have ;  so  that  a  special  preparation  one  really  needs, 
if  the  question  is  to  be  perfectly  clear  to  him.  And, 
indeed,  a  strict  demonstration,  one  which  shall  do 
away  with  all  ground  for  dispute,  is  hardly  to  be 
looked  for.     The  best  one  can  do  in  such  a  case  is  to 

23 


24         The  Life  aiid  Teachings  of  yesus. 

establish  probabilities,  and  the  result  must  be  judged, 
not  by  its  being  demonstrably  certain  in  any  case,  but 
by  the  number  of  cases  to  which  it  can  be  made  to 
apply  with  naturalness.  At  any  rate  the  solution 
must  be  attempted,  for  upon  it,  in  a  very  large  degree, 
one's  conception  of  the  Gospels  will  have  to  depend. 

What  then  is  the  problem  that  calls  for  solution? 
Stated  very  briefly  it  is  this.  Our  first  three  Gospels, 
the  Gospels  which  sometimes  are  known  as  the  synop- 
tic Gospels,  to  distinguish  them  from  the  Gospel  of 
John,  are  connected  with  one  another  in  a  very  curious 
way,  which  commentators  from  early  times  have  no- 
ticed, and  have  made  more  or  less  satisfactory  attempts 
to  explain.  While  each  of  the  Gospels  contains 
matter  which  is  not  to  be  found  in  either  of  the  other 
two,  yet  there  is  general  resemblance  between  them 
which  is  very  decided.  In  all  of  them  there  is  the 
same  general  order  of  events.  There  are  long  sections 
which  correspond  very  largely  word  for  word,  and  this 
verbal  agreement,  in  a  greater  or  less  degree,  extends 
to  nearly  all  of  the  material  which  is  common  to  two 
or  more  of  the  Gospels.  But  alongside  of  this  re- 
semblance there  are  differences  also,  and  the  differences 
are  just  as  decided  as  the  resemblances  are.  Not  a  few 
narratives  are  placed  in  quite  different  connections 
by  different  Evangelists.  The  most  of  Jesus'  sayings 
are  assigned  to  two  or  more  different  occasions.  It  is 
very  seldom  that  narratives  are  absolutely  identical, 
one  an  exact  copy  of  the  other,  and  in  the  midst 
of  verbal  resemblances  there  often  are  strange  differ- 
ences, which  it  has  taken  all  the  ingenuity  of  commen- 
tators to  keep  from  the  appearance  of  discrepancy.  It 
is  evident  that  we  have  here  a  complicated  literary 
problem,  which  it  will  not  be  possible  to  solve  without 


The  Synoptic  Gospels.  25 

going  into  a  somewhat  tedious  and  laborious  com- 
parison of  details ;  but  before  doing  this  let  us  look 
at  a  few  more  general  considerations,  which  will  help 
to  clear  the  ground. 

All  explanations,  it  will  be  seen,  would  fall  roughly 
into  three  classes.  Either  our  Gospels  are  quite  inde- 
pendent of  one  another,  or  they  are  not ;  and  if  they 
are  not  independent,  then  either  they  must  have  used 
a  common  source  or  sources,  or  they  must,  along  with 
this  perhaps,  have  made  use  also  of  one  another.  In 
our  own  country  it  is  the  first  view  which  is  by  all 
means  the  most  popular  one,  and  it  is  not  hard  to  see 
why  this  should  be  so.  At  first  glance  it  might  appear 
to  be  the  most  natural  view,  as  certainly  it  is  the 
simplest.  Not  very  many  men  have  either  the  time  or 
the  inclination  for  the  somewhat  complex  critical  pro- 
cesses which  are  necessary  for  understanding  the  basis 
on  which  either  of  the  other  theories  rests,  and  perhaps 
it  is  true  that  the  very  different  results  which  the  Ger- 
man critics  have  reached  are  not  calculated  to  impress 
one  with  the  accuracy  of  the  methods  which  they  use. 
But,  what  also  is  an  important  reason,  it  is  the  view 
which  almost  of  necessity  follows  certain  theories  of 
inspiration,  the  only  one  that  can  very  well  be  held 
when  criticism  has  chiefly  to  do  with  harmonizing.  The 
manner  in  which  this  theory  would  seek  to  explain  the 
connection  between  the  three  Gospels  is  briefly  as  fol- 
lows. The  repetition  of  sayings  and  of  incidents  from 
the  life  of  Jesus  naturally  would  play  an  important 
part  in  the  teaching  of  the  Apostles;  and  in  the 
poverty  of  the  Aramaic  dialect  these  would  tend  to 
become  more  or  less  stereotyped  in  form,  and  in  course 
of  time  would  grow  into  a  considerable  body  of  tradi- 
tion.    For  a  while  this  oral  teaching  would  be  suffi- 


26         The  Life  arid  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

cient,  but  as  the  Church  grew,  and  tradition  came  less 
to  be  relied  on,  a  need  would  be  felt  for  more  authori- 
tative records  ;  and  to  meet  this  need,  it  is  supposed 
that  about  the  same  time  our  three  Gospels  appeared. 
In  this  way  it  is  sought  to  explain  both  the  resem- 
blances and  the  diflferences,  the  former  by  the  fact 
that  all  the  narratives  were  drawn  from  a  common 
body  of  tradition,  the  latter  by  the  natural  discrepan- 
cies to  be  expected  in  independent  reports  of  oral 
teaching. 

Now  no  doubt  this  theory  has  in  it  a  certain  amount 
of  truth.  The  words  of  Jesus,  at  any  rate,  must  early 
have  become  to  a  certain  extent  fixed  in  form,  for  it 
would  have  been  impossible,  when  the  Gospel  litera- 
ture first  arose,  for  any  one  to  reproduce  the  longer 
sayings  and  discourses  which  have  come  down  to  us, 
without  some  such  oral  tradition  as  this  to  fall  back 
upon.  But  the  more  one  tries  to  make  this  serve  for 
explaining  the  whole  problem,  the  less  he  will  find  that 
it  will  answer.  For  however  it  may  seem  at  first  to 
account  for  the  verbal  resemblances,  it  by  no  means 
accounts  so  well  for  the  resemblances  in  order.  Let  us, 
for  example,  compare  roughly  Mark  with  Luke.  Up 
to  Luke  9  :  17,  we  find  that  Luke  has  nearly  every 
incident  that  Mark  has,  and,  with  a  very  few  excep- 
tions, in  the  same  sequence.  Then,  after  omitting  a 
section  from  Mark,  Luke  follows  his  order  up  to  9  :  51. 
Then  comes  a  long  section  which  is  peculiar  to  Luke, 
but  at  the  end  of  this  section  he  takes  up  Mark  again 
where  he  left  ofi",  and  follows  Mark's  order  to  the  end. 
That  is,  we  may  put  it  as  a  general  rule,  to  which 
there  are  hardly  a  handful  of  exceptions,  that  the  sec- 
tions which  are  common  to  Luke  and  Mark  are  placed 
by  them  in  the  same  relative  position  to  one  another. 


The  Synoptic  Gospels.  27 

Now  clearly  this  similarity  cannot  be  accidental. 
The  order  of  events,  as  well  as  the  events  themselves, 
must  have  been  a  part  of  this  oral  tradition.  And  so 
we  have  to  suppose  that  it  was  something  very  differ- 
ent from  what  we  ordinarily  understand  tradition  to  be. 
We  must  suppose  that  it  was  something  like  the  oral 
tradition  of  the  Rabbis,  something  settled  down  to  the 
wording  and  to  the  sequence  of  events,  even  to  the 
connecting  links  between  the  different  narratives,  and 
then  taught  by  the  Apostles  and  learned  by  their 
disciples,  and  everywhere  recognized  as  authoritative. 
We  cannot  think  of  such  a  narrative  as  this  springing 
up  naturally  from  random  teachings  ;  it  must  have  been 
moulded  positively  into  a  definite  form.  Then  we  must 
suppose  that  there  were  schools  where  this  narrative 
was  carefully  committed  to  memory  by  the  disciples  ; 
single  narratives  they  might  have  caught  simply  by 
listening  to  them,  but  a  long  and  intricate  series  of 
events  they  only  could  have  come  to  know  by  memo- 
rizing it.  But  surely  all  this  elaborate  machinery  is 
very  unlikely,  natural  enough  in  the  Rabbinical 
schools,  where  religion  had  come  to  be  a  dead  thing, 
but  not  natural  in  the  freedom  and  spontaneity  of  the 
Apostolic  age.  What  is  more  important,  we  have  no 
trace  of  anything  at  all  like  it,  either  in  the  New 
Testament  or  outside  of  it.  If  any  such  tradition  was 
widely  spread,  we  certainly  should  expect  to  find  it 
cropping  out  in  the  Acts  or  in  the  Kpistles,  as  well  as 
in  the  writings  of  the  Fathers,  a  little  later  on,  but  no 
such  thing  do  we  find.  The  Apostles  appear  to  have 
confined  themselves  very  largely  in  their  preaching  to 
the  great  historic  facts  of  the  Messiahship  of  Jesus,  his 
Death,  his  Resurrection  ;  and  incidents  from  Jesus'  life, 
and  words  of  his,  they  only  made  use  of  as  occasion 


28  The  Life  and  Teachings  of  fcsiis. 

called  for  them,  for  edification,  and  not  with  any  wish 
to  settle  details  of  history.  And  it  is  such  a  clumsy 
way  of  going  to  work  ;  the  Apostles,  if  they  went  to 
all  this  trouble  must  surely  have  thought  that  such  a 
record  was  very  important,  but  why  then  did  they  not 
think  of  writing  ?  it  would  have  been  infinitely  easier, 
and  it  would  have  served  their  purpose  even  better. 
This  is  a  very  different  case  from  the  case  of  the  Rab- 
bis, where  the  tradition  had  grown  up  very  gradually 
by  small  accretions ;  here  the  tradition  had  to  be 
formed  outright  as  well  as  learned.  Besides  all  this,  if 
the  form  was  so  important,  how  is  it  that  our  three  re- 
ports, which  at  least,  one  would  think,  must  have  come 
to  us  at  third  or  fourth  hand,  after  all  the  care  taken  to 
secure  exactness,  should  show  such  decided  differences. 
And  it  is  quite  conclusive  that  the  differences,  as  will 
be  seen  later,  so  often  show  that  they  are  dependent 
upon  literary  motives,  motives  which  would  have  no 
play  in  oral  teaching,  that  we  can  hardly  doubt  that 
the  Evangelists  actually  had  documents  before  them. 

As  for  the  second  theory  in  its  simplest  form,  that  all 
our  Gospels  drew  from  a  common  source,  it  never  has 
been  able  to  explain  enough  to  make  it  necessary  to 
delay  upon  it.  It  may  be  that  here  too  is  a  partial 
truth,  but  it  will  not  serve  to  explain  the  whole  prob- 
lem, unless  it  is  combined  with  the  third  hypothesis, 
that  the  Gospels  in  some  way  have  made  use  of  one 
another.  And  indeed  this  is  only  what  we  might  have 
looked  for.  Bver}'  author  is  supposed  to  make  use  of 
those  who  have  written  before  him ;  Luke  certainly 
found  a  number  of  such  predecessors,  as  he  tells  us 
himself,  men  who  were  at  least  as  near  the  Apostolic 
age  as  he  was,  and  a  refusal  to  make  use  of  their  labors 
only  would  have  been  to  lessen  the  value  of  his  own 


TJie  Synoptic  Gospels.  29 

work.  That  some  such  interdependence  there  was 
then  will  be  assumed,  but  just  what  it  was  is  still  to  be 
determined.  The  possibilities,  as  we  see,  are  numer- 
ous, and  it  will  be  well  to  begin  by  excluding  some  of 
them,  so  as  to  simplify  the  question  as  much  as  pos- 
sible. 

In  the  first  place,  then,  is  Mark  taken  from  Matthew 
or  lyuke,  or  from  both  of  them  together  ?  At  once  we 
say  that  this  is  not  natural  to  suppose.  For  Mark  is 
by  far  the  shortest  of  the  Gospels,  with  comparatively 
little  that  is  peculiar  to  itself,  and  it  is  not  easy  to  see 
why  any  one  should  have  thought  it  necessary  to 
abridge  the  fuller  accounts  which  he  had  before  him, 
without  adding  anything  that  was  essentially  new. 
To  get  the  history  within  a  shorter  compass  must,  it 
would  seem,  have  been  an  object  with  him  ;  but  there 
is  no  good  reason  why  he  should  have  wished  to  do 
this,  and,  besides,  it  is  not  always  borne  out  by  the 
way  in  which  he  goes  to  work.  For,  instead  of  con- 
densing the  narratives,  he  very  often  expands  them ; 
he  adds  details  which  are  simply  picturesque,  and  he 
even  introduces  some  new  incidents  of  his  own,  though 
none  of  these  have  any  great  importance.  That  Mark 
is  an  abstract  of  either  of  the  other  Gospels  singly  we 
may  dismiss  at  once  ;  for  if  we  compare  Mark  with 
Luke,  for  instance,  we  shall  find  that  over  and  over 
again  lyuke  is  plainly  secondary,  so  that  Mark's  ac- 
count could  not  have  been  derived  from  him.  One 
instance  will  be  sufficient  to  show  this.  I^uke  has  this 
saying  of  Jesus  :  "No  man  rendeth  a  piece  from  a  new 
garment,  and  putteth  it  upon  an  old  garment ;  else  he 
will  rend  the  new,  and  also  the  piece  from  the  new  will 
not  agree  with  the  old."  '     But  Mark  gives  the  saying 

'  Luke  5  :  36. 


30         The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesiis. 

in  a  somewhat  different  form:  "No  man  seweth  a 
piece  of  undressed  cloth  on  an  old  garment  :  else  that 
which  should  fill  it  up  taketh  from  it,  the  new  from 
the  old,  and  a  worse  rent  is  made."  '  It  is  clear  that 
Mark  has  the  original  form,  and  so  he  could  not  well 
be  copying  here  from  Luke.  And  Mark  cannot  have 
drawn  wholly  from  Matthew,  for  just  the  same  reason 
that  he  cannot  have  drawn  from  Luke,  because  there 
are  too  many  passages  in  which  Mark  is  plainly  origi- 
nal. So  when,  instead  of  the  question  which  Mark 
has,  ' '  Why  callest  thou  me  good  ?  "  ■  Matthew  makes 
Jesus  say,  "Why  askest  thou  me  concerning  that 
which  is  good  ?  "  ^  it  is  plain  that  Mark  did  not  get  his 
more  original  form  from  the  other  Gospel. 

And  it  is  not  much  easier  if  we  suppose  that  Mark 
is  combining  the  other  Gospels  ;  besides  what  has  been 
said  already,  it  is  not  possible  to  show  any  principle  on 
which  he  makes  this  combination.  It  must  have  been 
extremely  arbitrary.  Sometimes  he  follows  one  of  his 
sources  throughout  a  narrative,  jumping  over  to  the 
other  for  a  single  word  or  phrase,  and  again  he  forms 
an  intricate  mosaic  from  the  two.  Such  a  w^ay  of  going 
to  work  is  very  improbable,  when  we  consider  that  this 
combination  and  revision  of  two  narratives  which  go 
over  essentially  the  same  ground  is  not  something  in- 
cidental to  a  larger  task,  but  must  have  been  one  of  the 
author's  main  purposes  in  writing  ;  and  it  is  all  the 
more  improbable  as  Mark  has  a  definite  style  of  his 
own,  and  has  not  brought  over  any  of  the  peculiarities, 
sometimes  very  marked,  which  distinguish  the  Gospels 
from  which   it  is  supposed  he  is  compiling.      Nor, 

'  Mk.  2  :2i. 
2  Mk.  lo  :  i8. 
'^  Matt.  19  :  17. 


The  Synoptic  Gospels.  31 

again,  is  it  probable  that  an  editor  would  have  been 
able  in  so  large  a  majority  of  cases  to  escape  the  sec- 
ondary touches  in  both  of  his  authorities,  following 
Luke  when  Matthew  was  secondary,  and  vice  versa. 

And  it  is  equally  unlikely  that  there  is  any  direct 
connection  between  Matthew  and  Luke ;  at  most  it 
can  have  been  an  acquaintance  which  affected  details, 
and  not  the  real  substance  of  the  narrative.  For  as 
one  is  sometimes  plainly  secondary  and  unoriginal, 
and  sometimes  the  other,  neither  could  have  been  the 
primary  source  of  the  other,  just  as  neither  could  have 
been  the  source  for  Mark.  And  this  is  especially  evi- 
dent when  we  look  at  the  great  body  of  sayings  which 
are  wanting  in  Mark,  but  which  Matthew  and  Luke 
have  in  common.  These  sayings  must  have  come 
from  a  common  source,  but  it  is  also  clear  that  neither 
Evangelist  could  have  got  them  from  the  other.  Luke's 
text  to  a  very  large  extent  is  so  evidently  a  free  ren- 
dering, almost  a  paraphrase  sometimes,  that  it  is  quite 
impossible  that  Matthew's  more  original  version  could 
have  come  from  it '  ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  the 
original  connection  which  Luke  gives  to  very  many 
of  the  sayings  he  never  could  have  guessed  if  he  had 
taken  them  from  Matthew.'  And  it  becomes  especially 
probable  that  there  is  not  even  a  slight  connection 
between  the  two,  when  we  look  at  the  account  which 
each  gives  of  the  birth  of  Jesus,  and  of  his  appearances 
after  the  resurrection.  It  hardly  seems  as  if  either, 
when  he  wrote  his  account,  could  have  known  any- 
thing of  the  other.     Matthew,  for  example,  tells  of  an 


'  Luke  6  :  35-38,  46-49  ;    n  :  21,  22,  36,  47, 48  ;    13  :  28,  29  ;  15  ; 
3-7,  etc. 
-  Luke  II  :  2,  9 ;  12  :  2,  58  ;  13  :  24-29  ;  14  :  34  I  I5  : 4,  etc. 


32  The  Life  and  Teachhigs  of  yesus. 

appearance  in  Galilee  which  Ivuke  seems  expressly  to 
exclude. '  And  this  is  particularly  clear  in  the  narra- 
tive of  the  infancy.  It  is  not  so  much  that  the  narra- 
tives of  the  birth  and  infancy  of  Jesus  differ  from  each 
other  in  the  two  Gospels,  as  that  they  are  in  evident 
ignorance  of  each  other.  According  to  Luke  the 
parents  of  Jesus  openly  present  him  in  the  Temple, 
and  then  return  quietly  home  to  Nazareth  ;  Luke 
knows  nothing  of  any  plot  of  Herod,  or  of  any  flight 
into  Egypt.  Matthew,  on  the  other  hand,  supposes 
that  Bethlehem  was  the  home  of  Joseph  and  Mary. 
Here  Jesus  lives  for  some  little  time  ;  and  when,  after 
the  return  from  Egypt,  they  go  to  Nazareth,  Matthew 
has  no  suspicion  that  they  had  ever  lived  there  before. 
So  that  for  neither  of  them  would  it  have  been  possible 
to  write  as  he  did,  if  either  had  been  acquainted  with 
the  narrative  of  the  other. 

So  far  then  the  results  are  only  negative.  We  have 
found  that  Mark  is  not  taken  from  Matthew  or  Luke, 
and  that  Matthew  and  Luke  are  not  taken  one  from 
the  other.  But  when  we  go  a  step  farther,  and  ask, 
Do  Matthew  and  Luke  make  use  of  Mark  ?  we  no 
longer  find  the  same  objections.  Certainly,  so  far  as 
the  general  narrative  goes,  both  of  the  Gospels  might 
seem  to  have  incorporated  Mark  almost  entire.  Up  to 
Mark  6  :  45,  nearly  the  whole  of  Mark's  narrative  is 
found  in  Luke,  and,  as  has  been  said,  with  two  or 
three  exceptions  in  the  same  relative  order  of  events. 
Then  Mark  6  :  46-8  :  27  is  omitted,  but  reasons  for  this 
can  easily  be  found,  and  one  verse  from  the  omitted 
section  Luke  has  in  the  latter  part  of  his  book,"  just  as 


'  Luke  24  :  50-53  ;  Acts  i  :  4. 
"^  Luke  12  :  i. 


The  Synoptic  Gospels.  33 

when  in  other  cases  he  leaves  out  shorter  passages,  he 
shows  afterwards  that  he  is  acquainted  at  least  with 
portions  of  them.'  And  the  awkward  way  in  which  he 
tries  to  bridge  over  the  gap  shows  clearly  enough  that 
he  is  making  an  omission.  For  Mark  reads,  "And 
straightway  he  constrained  his  disciples  to  enter  into 
the  boat,  and  to  go  before  him  unto  the  other  side  to 
Bethsaida,  while  he  himself  sendeth  the  multitude 
away.  And  after  he  had  taken  leave  of  them,  he  de- 
parted into  the  mountain  to  pray. ' '  "  Now  lyuke  stops 
just  before  this  last  sentence,  and  passes  to  Mark  8  :  27, 
where  Jesus  is  travelling  with  his  disciples  through  the 
villages  of  Csesarea  Philippi,  but  he  joins  the  two 
together  in  this  fashion  :  ' '  And  it  came  to  pass,  as  he 
was  praying  alone,  the  disciples  were  with  him.  And 
he  asked  them,  saying,  Who  do  the  multitudes  say 
that  I  am?  "  ^  Here  we  see  he  gets  his  connection, 
but  it  is  somewhat  at  the  expense  of  the  meaning  ;  for 
when  Jesus  was  in  the  mountains  he  might  have  been 
alone,  but  he  hardly  could  be  alone  when  the  disciples 
were  with  him.  Finally,  from  Mark  8  :  27  to  the  end 
of  the  book,  we  find  practically  the  whole  in  Luke. 
And  in  Matthew  the  case  is  not  much  different.  In 
the  first  part  of  Matthew  nearly  all  of  Mark's  material 
is  present,  although  the  order  is  not  very  closely  fol- 
lowed ;  and  yet  even  here  there  are  long  sections 
where  the  order  corresponds.*  But  from  Mark  6  :  14 
to  the  end,  the  narratives  of  Mark,  with  a  very  few  ex- 
ceptions, are  found  in  Matthew,  and,  as  before,  in  the 
same  order. 


'  Luke  12  :  lo  ;  i6  :  16-18. 

'  Mk.  6  :  45,  46. 

"  Luke  9  :  18. 

*  Mk.  1 : 1-28  ;  2:1-3:5;  3  :  22-4  :  34. 


34         The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus . 

And  when  we  come  to  compare  the  Gospels  more 
critically,  we  shall  find  the  evidence  for  a  dependence 
on  Mark  appearing  constantly.  This  secondary 
character  is  perhaps  rather  more  apparent  in  Luke 
than  it  is  in  Matthew  ;  if  we  examine  Luke  carefully, 
traces  of  Mark  may  be  discovered  lying  everywhere  at 
the  base  of  it.  The  proof  of  this  in  detail  has  been 
given  most  elaborately  by  Professor  Weiss,  and  we 
shall  not  attempt  to  go  over  it  here  ;  but  as  a  single 
example  the  story  of  Jairus'  daughter  may  be  taken, 
as  it  is  given  by  Luke  and  Mark. 


And  -when  Jesus  had  crossed 
over  again  in  the  boat  unto 
the  other  side,  a  great  multi- 
tude were  gathered  unto  him  : 
and  he  was  by  the  sea.  And 
there  cometh  one  of  the  rulers 
of  the  synagogue  Jairus  by 
name ;  and  seeing  him,  he 
falleth  at  his  feet,  and  beseech- 
eth  him  much,  saying,  My 
little  daughter  is  at  the  point 
of  death :  I  pray  thee,  that 
thou  come  and  lay  thy  hands 
on  her,  that  she  may  be 
made  whole,  and  live.  And 
he  went  with  him  ;  and  a  great 
multitude  followed  him,  and 
they  thronged  him.  And  a 
woman  which  had  an  issue  of 
blood  twelve  years,  and  had 
suffered  many  things  of  many 
physicians,  and  had  spent  all 
that  she  had,  and  was  nothing 
bettered,  but  rather  grew 
worse,  having  heard  the  things 
3 


And  as  Jesus  returned,  the 
multitude  welcomed  him  ;  for 
they  were  all  waiting  for  him. 
And  behold  there  came  a  man 
named  Jairus,  and  he  was  a 
ruler  of  the  synagogue  :  and 
he  fell  down  at  Jesus'  feet  and 
besought  him  to  come  into  his 
house ;  for  he  had  an  onlj- 
daughter,  about  twelve  years 
of  age,  and  she  lay  a-dying. 
But  as  he  went  the  multitude 
thronged  him.  And  a  woman 
having  an  issue  of  blood  twelve 
years,  who  had  spent  all  her 
living  upon  physicians,  and 
could  not  be  healed  of  any, 
came  behind  him  and  touched 
the  border  of  his  garment : 
and  immediately  the  issue  of 
her  blood  stanched.  And 
Jesus  said,  Who  is  it  that 
touched  me?  And  when  all 
denied  Peter  said,  and  they 
that  were  with  him,  Master, 


The  Synoptic  Gospels. 


35 


concerning  Jesus,  came  in  the 
crowd  behind,  and  touched  his 
garment.  For  she  said,  If  I 
touch  but  his  garments,  I  shall 
be  made  whole.  And  straight- 
way, the  fountain  of  her  blood 
was  dried  up,  and  she  felt  in 
her  body  that  she  was  healed 
of  her  plague.  And  straight- 
way Jesus,  perceiving  in  him- 
self that  the  power  proceeding 
from  him  had  gone  forth, 
turned  him  about  in  the  crowd 
and  said,  Who  touched  my 
garments?  And  his  disciples 
said  unto  him,  Thou  seest  the 
multitude  thronging  thee,  and 
sayst  thou.  Who  touched  me  1 
And  he  looked  round  about  to 
see  her  that  had  done  this 
thing.  But  the  woman,  fear- 
ing and  trembling,  knowing 
what  had  been  done  to  her, 
came  and  fell  down  before 
him,  and  told  him  all  the 
truth.  And  he  said  unto  her, 
Daughter,  thy  faith  hath  made 
thee  whole  ;  go  in  peace,  and 
be  whole  of  thy  plague.  While 
he  yet  spake,  they  come  from 
the  ruler  of  the  synagogue's 
house,  saying,  Thy  daughter 
is  dead  :  why  troublest  thou 
the  Master  further!  But 
Jesus,  not  heeding  the  words 
spoken,  saith  unto  the  ruler 
of  the  synagogue,  Fear  not, 
only  believe.  And  he  suffered 
no  man  to  follow  with    him, 


the  multitudes  press  thee  and 
crush  thee.  But  Jesus  said, 
Some  one  did  touch  me  :  for  I 
perceived  that  power  had  gone 
forth  from  me.  And  when  the 
woman  saw  that  she  was  not 
hid,  she  came  trembling,  and 
falling  down  before  him  de- 
clared in  the  presence  of  all 
the  people  for  what  cause  she 
touched  him,  and  how  she  was 
healed  immediately.  And  he 
said  unto  her,  Daughter,  thy 
faith  hath  made  thee  whole; 
go  in  peace.  While  he  yet 
spake,  there  cometh  one  from 
the  ruler  of  the  synagogue's 
house,  saying,  Thy  daughter 
is  dead  ;  trouble  not  the  Mas- 
ter, But  Jesus,  hearing  it, 
answered  him,  Fear  not  :  only 
believe,  and  she  shall  be  made 
whole.  And  when  he  came  to 
the  house,  he  suffered  not  any 
man  to  enter  in  with  him, 
save  Peter,  and  John,  and 
James,  and  the  father  of  the 
maiden  and  her  mother.  And 
all  were  weeping  and  bewail- 
ing her  :  but  he  said.  Weep 
not ;  for  she  is  not  dead,  but 
sleepeth.  And  they  laughed 
him  to  scorn,  knowing  that  she 
was  dead.  But  he,  taking  her 
by  the  hand,  called,  saying. 
Maiden,  arise.  And  her  spirit 
returned,  and  she  rose  up 
immediately  :  and  he  com- 
manded   that    something    be 


TJie  Life  and  Teachings  of  fesus. 


save  Peter,  and  James,  and 
John  the  brother  of  James. 
And  they  come  to  the  house 
of  the  ruler  of  the  synagogue  ; 
and  he  beholdeth  a  tumult, 
and  many  weeping  and  wail- 
ing greatly.  And  when  he 
was  entered  in,  he  saith  unto 
them,  Why  make  ye  a  tumult 
and  weep  ?  the  child  is  not 
dead,  but  sleepeth.  And  they 
laughed  him  to  scorn.  •  But 
he,  having  put  them  all  forth, 
taketh  the  father  of  the  child 
and  the  mother,  and  them  that 
were  with  him,  and  goeth  in 
where  the  child  was.  And 
taking  the  child  by  the  hand, 
he  saith  unto  her,  Talitha 
cumi ;  which  is,  being  inter- 
preted, Damsel,  I  say  unto 
thee,  Arise.  And  straight- 
way the  damsel  rose  up  and 
walked ;  for  she  was  twelve 
years  old.  And  they  were 
amazed  straightway  with  a 
great  amazement.  And  he 
charged  them  much  that  no 
man  should  know  this  ;  and 
he  commanded  that  something 
should  be  given  her  to  eat. 
Mark  5  :  21-43. 


given   her  to   eat.     And    her 
parents  were  amazed  :  but  he 
charged  them  to  tell  no  man 
what  had  been  done, 
lyuke,  8  :  40-56. 


Without  going  into  too  great  detail,  some  of  the 
points  may  be  noticed  in  which  I^uke's  account  is 
secondary.  In  the  first  place  it  is  an  "  only ' '  daughter, 
and  this  looks  like  an  embellishment  to  make  the  scene 
a  trifle  more  pathetic.     Then  the  girl's  age,  which 


The  Synoptic  Gospels.  37 

Mark  has  a  reason  for  giving,  in  connection  with  the 
ability  of  the  girl  to  walk,  Luke  brings  in  at  the  out- 
set by  anticipation.  The  statement  in  I^uke  that  the 
crowds  thronged  Jesus,  most  naturally  requires  the 
accompanying  statement  in  Mark,  that  they  had  fol- 
lowed him.  In  the  healing  of  the  issue  of  blood,  I^uke 
makes  all  answer  Jesus'  question  with  a  denial,  al- 
though this  takes  the  wind  out  of  Peter's  words,  which 
imply,  quite  the  contrary,  that  of  necessity  they  must 
all  the  time  be  touching  him  ;  and  the  explanation 
which  Mark  gives  of  Jesus'  question,  rightly  an  expla- 
nation of  his  own,  and  given  in  connection  with  the 
question  itself,  Luke  puts  into  Jesus'  own  mouth.  The 
description  of  the  woman's  fear  follows  most  naturally 
after  the  statement  which  Mark  has  given,  and  which 
I^uke  omits,  ' '  And  Jesus  looked  round  about  to  see  her 
that  had  done  this  thing."  The  expression  "all  the 
truth ' '  is  amplified  in  Luke.  Passing  again  to  the 
continuation  of  the  first  story,  the  words  of  Jesus, 
' '  Fear  not :  only  believe, ' '  are  made  less  dramatic  by 
Luke's  addition,  "and  she  shall  be  made  whole"  ; 
and  this  expression,  too,  borrowed  from  an  earlier 
part  of  Mark's  story,  where  it  refers  to  recovery  from 
sickness,  is  not  so  appropriate  now  that  the  girl  is  dead. 
Then  Mark  tells  how  Jesus  entered  the  house,  rebuked 
the  mourners,  and,  after  putting  them  out,  entered  into 
the  dead  girl's  chamber.  Luke  confuses  this  in  two 
ways.  ' '  And  when  he  came  into  the  house,  he  suffered 
not  any  man  to  enter  in  with  him, ' '  says  Luke,  and 
doubtless  he  refers  to  entering  the  chamber,  though 
he  does  not  make  it  perfectly  plain.  But  after  this  he 
tells  about  the  conversation  with  the  mourners,  when 
Jesus  already  had  left  the  mourners  behind  him  ;  he 
reverses  the  natural  order  of  relation,  as  it  appears  in 


38         The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

Mark,  Again,  he  adds  an  explanatory  clause, 
' '  knowing  that  she  was  dead ' '  ;  and  the  statement, 
"  he  commanded  something  to  be  given  her  to  eat,"  is 
far  more  effectiv-e  from  a  literary  point  of  view  when  it 
ends  the  story.  Finally,  the  charge  that  no  man 
should  be  told  the  deed  is  evidently  connected  in 
Mark's  mind  with  the  stopping  of  the  multitudes  as 
soon  as  the  death  is  announced,  for  of  course  the  charge 
would  be  a  waste  of  words  if  the  house  was  thronged 
with  people ;  with  this,  too,  goes  Mark's  statement 
that  the  mourners  were  put  out.  But  lyuke,  while  he 
retains  the  charge,  has  omitted  what  leads  up  to  it. 

Now  what  we  find  in  this  narrative  we  can  find 
throughout.  Passages  in  Luke  appear  in  a  clearly  more 
original  form  in  the  second  Gospel.  Details  are  added 
which  are  intended  to  explain  the  older  account  and 
to  make  it  more  exact.'  Even  in  narratives  peculiar 
to  himself  Luke  shows  traces  of  Mark's  influence.'  Let 
us  look  only  at  one  case  of  this,  which  is  by  no  means 
the  clearest  case  that  might  be  given,  but  which  still 
has  some  probability  in  its  favor.  In  Mark  the  chapter 
on  the  second  coming  concludes  with  these  words : 
' '  Watch  therefore  !  for  ye  know  not  when  the  Lord  of 
the  house  cometh,  whether  at  even,  or  at  midnight, 
or  at  cock-crowing,  or  in  the  morning;  lest  coming  sud- 
denly he  find  you  sleeping.  And  what  I  say  unto  you 
I  say  unto  all,  Watch."  ^  What  we  wish  especially  to 
notice  are  these  two  phrases,  "  at  even,  or  at  midnight, 
or  at  cock-crowing,  or  in  the  morning,"  and  "  What  I 


'  Luke  3  :  15,  22  ;  4  :  5,  6,  13  ;  5  :  I7  ;  6  :  19  ;  7  :  21 ;  8  :  46, 
53  ;  9  :  31.  32  ;  II  :  18  ;  20  :  38  ;  22  :  45,  51 ;  21  :  20,  24. 

"^  Luke  4 :  22^,  24,  cf.  Mk.  6  :  3,  4  ;  5:  10,  cf.  Mk.  i  :  19  ;  7  : 
37,  cf.  Mk.  14  .  3. 

3  Mk.  13  :  35-37- 


The  Synoptic  Gospels.  39 

say  unto  you  I  say  unto  all "  ;  the  only  parallels  to 
these  phrases  are  found  in  a  single  passage  in  I^uke. 
"And  if  he  shall  come  in  the  second  watch,"  says 
Jesus,  "  and  if  in  the  third,  and  find  them  so,  blessed 
are  those  servants ' '  ;  and  shortly  after  Peter  asks, 
"  I/)rd,  speakest  thou  this  parable  unto  us,  or  even 
unto  all  ?  "  '  But  in  both  cases  the  words  come  in  more 
naturally  in  Mark.  The  discourse  on  the  second  com- 
ing, as  is  shown  by  the  warning  which  is  thrown  in, 
"  IvCt  him  that  readeth  understand,"  is  addressed  to 
Christians  generally,  so  that  such  an  ending  to  it  is 
very  appropriate ;  as  a  question  from  Peter,  on  the 
other  hand,  one  cannot  see  that  it  has  any  very  distinct 
meaning.  And  the  probability  of  this  conclusion  will 
be  strengthened  when  we  show,  as  we  shall  try  to  do 
in  another  place,  that  the  whole  of  the  passage  in 
Ivuke  is  only  a  free  condensation  of  a  longer  dis- 
course. 

And  this  connection  with  Mark  appears  too  in  cases 
where  Luke  has  not  wholly  understood  his  source.  This 
may  be  seen  in  a  phrase  which  Mark  uses  in  the  ac- 
count which  he  gives  of  the  first  day  at  Capernaum : 
"And  they  were  astonished  at  his  teaching,  for  he 
taught  them  as  having  authority,  and  not  as  the 
scribes."  ^  Luke,  in  his  parallel  account,  also  uses  the 
same  word,  iB,ovaia^  but  it  is  with  a  different  meaning: 
' '  And  they  were  astonished  at  his  teaching,  for  his 
word  was  with  authority. ' '  ^  The  narrative  goes  on  to 
tell  how  the  people,  in  surprise,  exclaimed,  ' '  With 
authority  and  power  he  commandeth  the  unclean  spirits, 
and  they  come  out ' '  ;  and  this  new  meaning  of  the 


'  Luke  12  :  38,  41. 
'  Mk.  1 :  22. 
^  Luke  4  :  32. 


40  The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jestis. 

word,  implying  miraculous  power,  Luke  has  carried 
back  into  the  preceding  phrase,  as  will  be  evident  if 
one  will  compare  the  similarity  of  the  wording  in  the 
two  places.  But  it  is  clear  that  the  word  ought  to  re- 
fer, as  in  Mark,  to  his  teaching,  and  not  to  his  miracu- 
lous power,  if  for  no  other  reason  because  the  miracle 
had  not  yet  been  performed.  When,  too,  Luke,  in  the 
narrative  of  the  entry  to  Jerusalem,  makes  the  "  cer- 
tain of  those  who  stood  there,"  of  Mark's  account,  the 
owners  of  the  colt,  it  seems  like  an  inference,  and  a 
mistaken  inference,  from  Mark's  words ;  for  the  way 
in  which  the  objection  is  made,  and  the  failure  to  recog- 
nize Jesus'  disciples,  agrees  better  with  the  character 
of  bystanders,  and  it  is  more  likely  that  there  were  a 
number  of  bystanders  than  that  there  were  several  own- 
ers of  the  colt.  Mark,  again,  in  the  account  of  the 
paralytic  man,  mentions  in  the  middle  of  his  narrative 
that  certain  scribes  were  present ' ;  but  Luke  antici- 
pates this  remark  at  the  beginning  of  his  account,  and 
explains  it  as  a  concerted  meeting  of  Pharisees  and 
scribes  out  of  every  village  of  Galilee  and  Judsea  and 
Jerusalem,  "^  which  can  hardly  be  considered  likely. 
Another  misunderstanding  occurs  in  the  account  of  the 
crucifixion,  where  the  oflfering  of  vinegar,  according  to 
Mark's  account,  was  far  from  being  intended  in  mock- 
ery, as  Luke  supposes  ;  and  where  the  symbolism  which 
Mark  attaches  to  the  rending  of  the  veil  of  the  Temple 
is  clearly  not  understood,  for  it  is  spoken  of  as  taking 
place  before  Jesus  died.  And,  finally,  the  remark  at 
the  close  of  Mark's  Gospel,  "  And  they  said  nothing  to 
any  one,  for  they  were  afraid, ' '  Luke  must  have  read, 
for  he  tries  to  get  around  it  by  what  evidently  is  a  mere 

'  Mk.  2  :  6. 
•2  Luke  5  :  17. 


The  Synoptic  Gospels.  41 

makeshift:  "Now  they  were  Mary  Magdalene,  and 
Joanna,  and  Mar}'-  the  mother  of  James  ;  and  the  other 
womeii  with  them  told  these  things  to  the  Apostles. ' ' 

The  same  phenomena  are  to  be  found  in  Matthew 
also.  Here,  too,  it  is  clear  that  we  have  to  do  with  a 
narrative  which  in  a  very  large  measure  is  secondary 
and  dependent,  and  that  it  is  dependent  upon  a  source 
which  at  least  strongly  resembles  our  Mark.  Incidents 
which  in  Mark  are  simply  placed  side  by  side,  the  first 
Evangelist  supposes  are  arranged  chronologically,  and 
once  this  leads  him  into  a  curious  mistake.  Mark, 
after  he  has  told  how  the  disciples  were  sent  out  two 
by  two,  mentions  the  effect  which  Jesus'  fame  had 
upon  Herod,  who  saw  in  him  John  the  Baptist  risen 
again.  This  gives  him  an  opportunity  for  telling  the 
story  of  how  John  had  been  murdered,  an  event  which 
he  represents  as  having  taken  place  some  time  before. 
After  this  digression  he  goes  back  to  his  narrative,  and 
relates  what  happened  on  the  disciples'  return,  namely, 
the  journey  to  the  other  side  of  the  lake.'  Now 
Matthew  also  has  the  same  events,  but  because  this 
journey  and  the  beheading  of  John  are  placed  by  Mark 
together,  he  supposes  that  they  are  connected  in  time, 
and  that  one  was  the  cause  of  the  other.  ^  But  he 
forgets  that  the  story  of  John's  murder  had  carried  the 
narrative  backwards,  so  that  really  he  is  making  the 
disciples  return  before  they  set  out.  So,  too,  he  has 
changes  and  additions,'  sometimes  exaggerations,* 
where  Mark's  text  is  undoubtedly  original  ;  the  ad- 
dition of  a  colt,  in  the  account  of  the  entry  into  Jeru- 

'  Mk.  6  : 7-30. 

2  Matt.  14  :  13. 

3  Matt.  3  =  7;  13  :  55,  58;  20:20;  21  :2,  19;  22:7,  11-13,  etc. 
^  Matt.  14  :  21. 


42  The  Life  and  Teachi^tgs  of  yesus. 

salem,  in  order  to  make  a  closer  correspondence  with 
prophecy,  is  a  very  evddent  case.  Again  there  are  a 
fairly  large  number  of  instances  where  Matthew's  text 
reads  a  little  unnaturally,  or  shows  an  actual  miscon- 
ception, which  we  can  explain  easily  by  comparing 
him  with  Mark.  So,  for  example,  in  the  dispute  about 
fasting,'  Matthew  makes  the  disciples  of  John  the 
questioners,  although  this  is  highly  improbable.  But 
if  we  turn  to  Mark  we  find  that  he  says  :  ' '  And  John's 
disciples  and  the  Pharisees  were  fasting.  And  they 
come  and  say  unto  him,  Why  do  John's  disciples  and 
the  disciples  of  the  Pharisees  fast,  but  thy  disciples  fast 
not  ?  "  *  Now  it  is  clear  that  the  ' '  they  ' '  of  Mark  is  in- 
definite, or  perhaps  it  refers  to  the  Pharisees  who  have 
been  spoken  of  in  the  narrative  just  before;  but  it  is 
also  clear  that  a  reader  might  refer  it  to  John's  dis- 
ciples, who  are  mentioned  in  the  preceding  sentence. 
Again,  at  the  end  of  one  of  the  Sabbath  cures  in 
Matthew  occur  the  words  :  "So  that  it  is  permitted  to 
do  good  on  the  Sabbath  day."  ^  But  in  Mark  the  same 
account  is  introduced  by  the  question,  "  Is  it  lawful  to 
do  good  on  the  Sabbath  day,  or  to  do  harm  ?  "  ^  and 
to  this  question  the  words  in  Matthew  seem  to  point. 
Another  case  not  quite  so  evident  occurs  in  the  story 
of  the  rich  young  man.  "It  is  hard,"  so  Matthew 
reads,  "  for  a  rich  man  to  enter  into  the  kingdom  of 
heaven.  And  again  I  say  unto  you,  it  is  easier  for  a 
camel  to  go  through  a  needle's  eye."  '  In  Mark,  how- 
ever, this  "again  "  comes  in  much  more  naturally: 

'  Matt.  9  :  14. 
2  Mk.  2  :  18. 

*  Matt.  12  :  12. 
"  Mk.  3  :  4. 

*  Matt.  19  :  23,  24. 


The  Synoptic  Gospels.  43 

"  And  Jesus  looked  round  about,  and  saith  to  his  dis- 
ciples, How  hardly  shall  they  that  have  riches  enter 
into  the  kingdom  of  God  !  And  the  disciples  were 
amazed  at  his  words.  But  Jesus  answered  again,  and 
saith  unto  them,  Children,  how  hard  is  it  to  enter 
into  the  kingdom  of  God."  '  One  more  example  may 
be  given,  which  perhaps  is  to  be  explained  in  the  same 
way.  In  Matthew,  at  the  close  of  the  address  to  the 
Twelve,  is  a  saying  which  runs  as  follows  :  ' '  Whoso- 
ever shall  give  to  drink  unto  one  of  these  little  ones  a 
cup  of  cold  water  only,  in  the  name  of  a  disciple,  verily 
I  say  unto  you,  he  shall  in  no  wise  lose  his  reward."  " 
Jesus  has  been  speaking  to  the  disciples  directly, 
"  Whosoever  receiveth  jj/^?^,  receiveth  me"  ;  and  the 
way  in  which  he  changes  now  to  the  expression,  "  one 
of  these  little  ones,"  does  not  strike  one  as  at  all 
natural.  But  in  Mark  the  saying  also  occurs  in  a  dif- 
ferent connection,  and  here  it  reads  :  ' '  Whosoever  shall 
^\Y^  you  to  drink  a  cup  of  cold  water."'  But  just 
before  it  we  find  the  saying,  which  also,  in  a  slightly 
different  form,  stands  just  before  it  in  Matthew  : 
' '  Whosoever  shall  receive  one  of  such  little  children 
in  my  name,  receiveth  me ' '  ;  and  here  it  is  to  actual 
children  that  the  saying  is  referred.  So  that  it  prob- 
ably is  from  this  passage  in  Mark  that  Matthew  bor- 
rows his  expression. 

And  another  fact  also  points  to  this  same  dependence, 
the  fact  that  in  Mark  there  is  a  definite  plot,  a  clearly 
developed  conception  of  the  course  of  Jesus'  ministry, 
which  Mark  has  followed  throughout,  but  which  the 
other  Evangelists  have  disarranged.     Mark  shows  how 

'  Mk.  10:23,  24. 

-  Matt.  10:42. 
*  Mk.  9  :  41. 


44         The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 


Jesus'  fame  began  at  Capernaum,  and  kept  constantly- 
spreading  ;  he  traces  the  development  of  the  Pharisees' 
hostility,  and  of  the  disciples'  belief;  he  carefully  re- 
serves the  confession  of  Jesus'  Messiahship  for  the  cul- 
minating day  at  Csesarea  Philippi,  and  when  before 
this  the  demons  salute  Jesus  as  the  Messiah,  he  makes 
Jesus  sternly  enjoin  silence  upon  them.  Then,  from 
the  day  at  Csesarea  Philippi,  the  whole  is  overshadowed 
by  the  approaching  death  ;  the  relations  with  the 
Pharisees  reach  their  height  in  a  series  of  attacks  and 
counter-attacks,  beginning  with  the  triumphal  entry  into 
Jerusalem,  and  ending  in  the  success  of  the  Pharisees' 
plots  :  but  even  in  the  midst  of  apparent  defeat,  the 
promise  of  victory  appears,  in  the  words  of  the  angel 
at  the  empty  tomb.  Any  such  clear-cut  plan,  with  in- 
dications all  the  time  appearing  that  point  to  it,  we 
shall  not  find  in  the  other  Gospels,  and  j-et  traces  of 
this  plan  which  Mark  follows  are  constantly  cropping 
out.  Mark,  for  example,  tells  how,  just  before  the 
choice  of  the  Apostles,  Jesus  healed  ' '  many  of  the 
sick.  And  the  unclean  spirits,  wheresoever  they  be- 
held him,  fell  down  before  him  and  cried.  Thou  art 
the  Son  of  God.  And  he  charged  them  much  that 
they  should  not  make  him  known."  '  Here  the  pro- 
hibition is  closely  connected  with  Mark's  view  of 
Jesus'  Messiahship.  But  Matthew,  in  the  same  ac- 
count,' tells  how  Jesus  "healed  all  the  sick,"  and 
' '  charged  them  that  they  should  not  make  him  known,  * ' 
although  this  has  no  meaning,  because  Jesus'  healing 
ministry  he  could  not  possibly  have  kept  a  secret  if  he 
had  wished  to  do  so.     Then  the  throngs  which  at- 

'  Mk.  3  :  II,  12. 

-  Matt.  12  :  15,  16.     Cf.  connection  in  both  Gospels  with  de- 
fence against  Pharisees. 


The  Synoptic  Gospels.  45 

tended  Jesus,  Mark  is  very  fond  of  describing.  He 
tells  how  Jesus  must  rise  up  a  great  while  before  day 
in  order  to  escape  them  ;  how  they  crowd  about  him 
so  that  none  can  approach  ;  so  that  he  has  not  leisure 
so  much  as  to  eat ;  how  he  can  no  longer  openly  enter 
into  a  city,  but  is  without  in  desert  places,  and  even 
here  the  people  come  from  every  quarter. '  The  other 
Evangelists  retain  some  of  the  elements  of  this  descrip- 
tion, but  they  do  not  at  all  appreciate  it.  I^uke,  in  his 
parallel  to  this  last  passage,  only  says,  "  But  so  much 
the  more  went  abroad  the  report  concerning  him  ;  and 
great  multitudes  came  together  to  hear,  and  to  be 
healed  of  their  infirmities.  But  he  withdrew  himself 
in  the  deserts  and  prayed  "  " :  he  misses  entirely  what 
Mark  portrays  so  vividly,  and  we  should  hardly  see 
why  he  spoke  of  the  desert  at  all,  if  we  had  not  Mark 
to  compare  him  with. 

Sometimes  also  we  have  evidence  that  Mark  was  used 
by  both  of  the  other  Evangelists  in  a  single  passage, 
which  shows  at  the  same  time  that  Matthew  and  Euke 
did  not  use  each  other.  One  such  case  there  is  in  the 
account  of  the  call  of  Levi :  "It  came  to  pass, ' '  says 
Mark,  "that  he  sat  at  meat  in  his  house"';  but 
whose  house  is  meant,  there  is  at  least  chance  for 
doubt.  And  the  other  Evangelists  we  find  actually 
have  interpreted  it  in  different  ways,  Matthew  suppos- 
ing that  it  means  Jesus'  own  house,  and  Luke  that  it 
is  the  house  of  Levi."  And  in  the  same  way  a  para- 
bolic saying  of  Jesus' ,  which  in  the  second  Gospel  is 


1  Mk.  1 :  45. 

"  I/uke  5  :  15, 16. 

^  Mk.  2  :  15. 

^Matt.  9  :  10  ;  I^uke  5  :  29. 


46         The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

given  without  remark — "  Beware  of  the  leaven  of  the 
Pharisees  "  ' — is  explained  by  Matthew  as  the  teaching 
of  the  Pharisees,  while  Luke  understands  it  to  mean 
their  hj^pocrisy.^  Probably  Mark  means  neither  the 
teachings  of  the  Pharisees  nor  their  hj^pocrisy,  for  he 
adds,  ' '  And  of  the  leaven  of  Herod, ' '  an  allusion  which 
points  to  the  plots  which  Mark  already  has  mentioned, 
and  which  the  Pharisees  and  Herodians  had  entered 
into  against  Jesus,  to  the  suspicions,  therefore,  which 
they  were  instilling  among  the  people. 

And  in  two  other  passages,  also,  this  may  be  seen, 
one  of  them  the  passage  with  which  Mark  starts  in  his 
Gospel,  the  account  of  the  first  day  at  Capernaum. 
Here  Mark  gives  a  consistent  picture,  whose  relation 
to  the  rest  of  his  design  is  evident,  forming,  as  it  does, 
a  vivid  description  of  the  beginning  of  Jesus'  ministry, 
with  the  first  awakenings  of  belief,  and  the  foretaste 
of  his  coming  popularit3^  Jesus  calls  his  four  disciples, 
and  with  them  enters  their  native  town,  Capernaum. 
It  is  the  Sabbath,  and  he  enters  the  synagogue  to 
teach.  The  people  are  amazed  at  his  teaching,  and 
their  amazement  is  increased  when  Jesus  performs  his 
first  miracle.  After  the  service  he  goes  to  the  home 
of  his  new  disciple,  where  another  miracle  takes  place, 
the  healing  of  Peter's  mother-in-law.  The  fame  of 
these  miracles  spreads  throughout  the  city,  and  at  sun- 
set the  whole  city  comes  together  to  be  healed.  But 
Jesus  has  not  come  to  Capernaum  only,  and  the  next 
morning  he  hurries  off  to  carry  the  Gospel  to  other 
cities  also.  But  both  of  the  other  Evangelists  succeed 
in  spoiling  this  narrative  ;  in  the  first  place  they  do 


'  Mk.  8 :  15. 

*  Matt.  16  :  12  ;  Luke  12:1. 


The  Synoptic  Gospels.  47 

not  notice  that  it  is  meant  as  an  introductory  piece, 
and  they  put  other  parts  of  Jesus'  ministry  before  it. 
Then  both  have  separated  the  call  of  Peter  from  the 
visit  to  Peter's  house.  I,uke  has  another  version  of 
the  call,  which  he  brings  in  later  on,  so  that  here  the 
name  of  Simon  comes  up  suddenly,  without  anything 
to  tell  us  who  Simon  is.  Matthew  again,  who  has 
dropped  the  account  of  the  Sabbath  cure  in  the  syna- 
gogue, still  makes  the  people  wait  till  sunset  before 
they  come  together,  although,  judging  from  the  narra- 
tive which  he  places  just  before,  it  was  not  a  Sab- 
bath day  at  all ;  and  to  L^uke  the  fact  that  it  was  a 
Sabbath  day  has  become  a  little  obscured,  for  he  says 
not  "when  the  sun  had  set,"  but  "  while  it  was  set- 
ting." And,  finally,  I^uke  in  the  conclusion  misses 
Mark's  intention,  for  he  says  that  the  people,  and  not 
the  disciples,  sought  Jesus  and  found  him.  But  even 
this  has  an  explanation  in  Mark  ;  in  Mark  Peter  tells 
Jesus,  ' '  All  are  seeking  thee. ' ' 

The  other  case  which  we  spoke  of  occurs  in  the 
account  of  the  last  days  at  Jerusalem,  in  the  discussions 
which  Jesus  had  with  his  opponents.  The  last  ques- 
tion which  is  put  to  Jesus  runs  as  follows  : 

And  one  of  the  scribes  came,  and  heard  them  questioning 
together,  and  knowing  that  he  had  answered  them  well,  asked 
him,  What  commandment  is  the  first  of  all  ?  Jesus  answered, 
The  first  is,  Hear,  O  Israel ;  The  Lord  our  God,  the  Lord  is 
one  :  and  thou  shalt  love  the  Lord  thy  God  with  all  thy 
heart,  and  with  all  thy  soul,  and  with  all  thy  mind,  and  with 
all  thy  strength.  The  second  is  this  :  Thou  shalt  love  thy 
neighbor  as  thyself.  There  is  none  other  commandment  greater 
than  these.  And  the  scribe  said  unto  him.  Of  a  truth,  Master, 
thou  hast  well  said  that  he  is  one  ;  and  there  is  none  other  but 
he  :  and  to  love  him  with  all  the  heart,  and  with  all  the  under- 
standing, and  with  all  the  strength,  and  to  love  his  neighbor  as 


48         The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

himself,  is  much  more  than  all  whole  burnt  ofiFerings  and  sacri- 
fices. And  when  Jesus  saw  that  he  answered  discreetly,  he  said 
unto  him.  Thou  art  not  far  from  the  kingdom  of  God.  And 
no  man  after  that  durst  ask  him  any  question.' 

Let  US  see  how  the  other  Evangehsts  treat  this  pas- 
sage. Matthew,  for  a  reason  which  will  be  suggested 
in  another  place,  gives  the  first  part  of  the  incident, 
but  he  omits  the  lawyer's  answer  ;  and  then,  just  as 
Mark  does,  he  gives  a  question  which  Jesus  in  turn 
puts  to  the  Pharisees.  But  that  he  may  not  lose 
entirely  what  he  has  omitted,  the  last  sentence  of  it, 
' '  neither  durst  any  man  from  that  day  forth  ask  him 
any  more  questions,"  he  places  at  the  very  end,  after 
the  question  which  Jesus  asks.  But  here  it  loses  the 
meaning  which  it  has  in  Mark,  and  no  longer  serves 
as  a  transition  from  the  questions  put  by  the  Pharisees 
to  the  counter-attack  by  Jesus.  And  lyuke  leaves  out 
the  incident  altogether ;  but  he  takes  a  sentence  from 
it,  the  beginning  of  the  scribe's  reply,  "  Master,  thou 
hast  well  said,"  and  places  it  at  the  end  of  the  pre- 
ceding incident,  the  attack  by  the  Sadducees,  although 
here  it  is  by  no  means  so  appropriate. 

So  far,  then,  there  is  good  reason  to  believe  that 
both  Matthew  and  Luke  have  incorporated  into  their 
work  the  narrative  of  Mark,  or,  at  least,  of  a  book  very 
similar  to  Mark.  There  are  other  indications,  it  is 
true,  which  will  have  to  be  considered  later  on,  and 
which  will  modify  our  view  somewhat ;  but  these  will  not 
affect  the  general  result  which  has  been  reached.  But 
now  we  are  prepared  to  go  a  step  further.  For,  besides 
using  Mark,  it  appears  that  both  the  Evangelists  must 
have  used  another  document  which  was  distinct  from 

'  Mk.  12  :  28-34. 


The  Synoptic  Gospels.  49 

Mark  ;  for  there  is  a  large  amount  of  material  which 
Mark  does  not  possess,  but  which  is  common  to  both 
Matthew  and  I,uke  ;  and  by  far  the  largest  part  of  this 
material  is  made  up  of  the  sayings  of  Jesus. 

Let  us  now  sum  up  our  results.  Mark  does  not 
know  Matthew  or  I,uke,  Matthew  and  L,uke  do  not 
know  each  other  ;  but  both  make  use  of  an  account 
very  similar  at  least  to  our  Mark,  and  of  another  docu- 
ment which  contained  at  any  rate  many  sayings  of 
Jesus.  So  far  the  process  has  been  comparatively 
simple  ;  but  there  is  one  other  fact  which  is  a  very 
important  one,  and  which  offers  no  little  complication. 
Not  only  do  Matthew  and  lyuke  agree  with  each  other 
in  the  case  of  material  which  Mark  does  not  possess, 
but  they  often  agree  with  each  other  in  opposition  to 
Mark.  To  put  it  in  another  way,  in  some  of  the  nar- 
ratives which  we  have  supposed  so  far  that  Matthew 
and  lyuke  derived  independently  from  Mark,  they 
agree  with  each  other  instead  of  with  Mark,  and  Mark's 
account  seems  to  be  a  secondary  one.  There  is  no 
need  to  multiply  examples  of  this  at  present ;  one  ex- 
ample will  be  found  in  the  healing  of  the  epileptic 
boy,'  where  the  correspondence  between  Matthew  and 
Luke  is  perfectly  evident.  How,  it  must  be  asked,  is 
this  fact  to  be  accounted  for  ? 

There  are  several  ways  in  which  it  might  be  ac- 
counted for.  It  is  possible  to  suppose  that  our  Mark 
is  only  a  revision  of  an  original  Mark,  which  Matthew 
and  Luke  use  ;  and  that  when  Matthew  and  Luke 
agree,  they  preserve  the  reading  of  this  original  Mark, 
which  the  revision  has  lost.  But  such  a  revision  is 
very  problematical,  and  indeed  critics  are  not  agreed  as 
to  whether  it  was  an  abridgment  or  an  enlargement  of 

1  Matt.  17  :  14/,  ;  Luke  9  :  37#-  ;  Mk.  9  :  14^. 


50         The  Life  and  Teachings  of  yesus. 

the  original  ;  in  either  case  the  theory  presents  serious 
difi&culties.  We  cannot  well  think  that  the  original 
Mark  was  shorter,  because,  with  very  slight  excep- 
tions, Matthew  and  Luke  together  contain  everything 
that  is  found  in  our  present  Mark.  The  original  Mark 
hardly  can  have  been  much  larger,  because,  in  one  of 
the  most  important  features,  the  order  of  events,  just 
as  soon  as  Matthew  and  Luke  cease  to  agree  with  our 
present  Mark,  they  cease  to  agree  with  each  other. 
Again,  Luke  might  have  known  Matthew  and  copied 
from  him  at  times,  or  Matthew  might  have  known 
Luke.  But  this  we  have  seen  is  not  at  all  likely,  and, 
besides,  it  would  only  account  for  the  resemblance,  and 
would  not  account  for  the  secondarj^  character  of  Mark. 
Let  us  apply  this  to  a  passage  at  the  beginning  of  the 
Gospel,  the  report  of  the  Baptist's  ministry,  where 
Matthew  and  Luke  agree  in  opposition  to  the  much 
shorter  account  of  Mark.  If  this  theory  is  true,  then 
the  brief  account  in  Mark  came  first,  and  was  ex- 
panded by  one  of  the  later  Evangelists,  let  us  say  by 
Matthew  ;  finally  Luke,  having  both  accounts  before 
him,  follows  Matthew  in  preference  to  Mark.  But  the 
objection  to  this  is,  that  Matthew  does  not  read  at  all 
like  a  secondary  account,  while  Mark  seems  clearly  to 
be  only  an  abridgment  of  Matthew.  But  this  very 
passage  suggests  at  once  the  explanation  which  we 
conceive  to  be  the  true  one.  Mark  also  has  before  him 
the  original  work  which  the  other  two  Evangelists 
both  use,  and  from  which  they  draw  their  sayings ; 
and  when  he  disagrees  with  Matthew  and  Luke,  the 
other  Evangelists  are  not  drawing  from  him,  but  all 
alike  are  drawing  from  the  original  source,  which  in 
this  particular  case  Mark  has  followed  less  closely  than 
the  others  have. 


The  Synoptic  Gospels.  ,51 

Let  us  now,  to  begin  with,  test  the  theory  by  a  case 
which  is  not  by  any  means  a  simple  one,  but  which 
perhaps  can  be  made  plain  :  we  shall  go  into  it  at  some 
length,  because  it  is  a  very  good  example  of  the  more 
intricate  phases  of  the  relation  between  the  Gospels, 
and  it  shows  clearly  that  there  is  a  relationship  there, 
if  only  we  can  get  at  it.  If  any  one  will  examine  the 
narrative  Mark  9  :  33-50,  and  compare  with  it  the 
parallel  accounts  in  Matthew  and  Luke, '  he  will  see 
that  they  present  a  somewhat  complex  problem.  The 
sayings  of  which  the  passage  is  composed  are  very 
miscellaneous,  and  apparently  they  are  put  together  in 
rather  an  arbitrary  manner.  The  parallel  passages, 
moreover,  differ  very  essentially  among  themselves,  and, 
on  top  of  all,  there  is  hardly  a  sentence  in  them  which 
does  not  occur  elsewhere  in  the  Gospels  in  a  different 
connection.  Taking  Mark  by  itself,  indeed,  there  is 
no  great  difi&culty.  Mark,  as  we  shall  see,  is  rather 
fond  of  combining  a  few  sayings  in  a  connection  of  his 
own.  He  has,  we  may  suppose,  two  incidents  to  give, 
Jesus'  rebuke  to  the  ambition  of  the  disciples,  and  the 
account  of  the  man  who  cast  out  demons  in  Jesus'  name. 
Just  what  Jesus  had  said  on  these  occasions  he  does  not 
know,  but  he  selects  a  few  sayings  from  among  the 
logia  which  seem  to  him  to  be  appropriate,  and  these 
he  weaves  into  his  account,  as  he  does  in  many  other 
cases.  And  Luke  accordingly,  when  he  has  followed 
Mark  in  giving  the  bare  incidents,  stops,  for  all  that 
follows,  the  sayings  about  offences,  and  about  the  sac- 
rifice of  an  offending  member,  he  has  met  with  in  his 
other  source,  and  he  knows  what  their  true  connection 
is.     But  in  Matthew  the  process  is  more  complicated. 


Matt.  18  :  1-35 ;  Luke  9  :  46-50. 


52         The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

He  starts  in,  indeed,  with  the  incident  which  Mark 
gives,  but  he  modifies  it  a  little.  Apparently  he  thinks 
that  the  reply  which  Mark  attributes  to  Jesus  is  not 
quite  pointed  enough,  which  indeed  it  is  not,  and  so  he 
introduces  a  saying  which  really  is  more  appropriate, 
though  it  belongs  to  another  narrative,  where  Jesus 
blesses  the  little  children.'  Then  he  omits  the  second 
incident  which  Mark  gives,  perhaps  because  he  has 
already  made  use  of  one  verse  of  it,*  and  takes  Mark 
up  again  at  the  forty-second  verse,  ' '  Whoso  shall  cause 
one  of  these  little  ones  which  believe  on  me  to  stumble, 
it  is  profitable  for  him  that  a  great  millstone  should  be 
hanged  about  his  neck,  and  that  he  should  be  sunk  in 
the  depth  of  the  sea." 

But  now  Matthew  introduces  a  verse  which  Mark 
does  not  have  :  ' '  Woe  imto  the  world  because  of  occa- 
sions of  stumbling  !  for  it  must  needs  be  that  the  occa- 
sions come ;  but  woe  to  that  man  through  whom  the 
occasion  cometh  ! ' '  And  if  we  turn  to  L,uke,  we  shall 
see  why  he  did  this.  For  L,uke  also  has  the  same  two 
verses  together  at  the  beginning  of  a  discourse,"  so  that 
they  must  have  been  together  in  the  source  ;  and  Mat- 
thew, finding  one  of  them  in  Mark,  turns  to  the  soiu"ce 
and  quotes  the  other.  But  then  he  turns  back  to  Mark 
again,  to  the  sajangs  about  offending  members,  and 
this  time  he  gets  through  with  Mark  for  good.  But  he 
adds  two  other  sayings,  because,  like  what  has  gone 
before,  they  have  to  do  with  children,  one  a  saying 
peculiar  to  himself,  and  the  other  a  parable  which  he 
takes  from  the  source.     This  parable  indeed  did  not 


'  Mark  lo  :  15. 

"^  Matt.  10  :  42,  cf.  Mk.  9  :  41. 

^Luke  17:  \ff. 


The  Synoptic  Gospels.  53 

originally  refer  to  children,  but  the  Evangelist  makes 
it  do  so  by  an  application  of  his  own. 

And  now  there  follows  another  series  of  sayings, 
commencing  with  certain  rules  of  Church  discipline, 
and  again  we  understand  why  this  is  introduced  if  we 
turn  to  lyuke.  For  we  have  seen  that  the  Evangelist 
has  already  quoted  two  verses  which  stood  at  the  head 
of  one  of  the  discourses  in  the  source,  and  this  dis- 
course, according  to  Euke,  goes  on  as  follows  :  ' '  Take 
heed  to  yourselves  :  if  thy  brother  sin,  rebuke  him ; 
and  if  he  repent,  forgive  him.  And  if  he  sin  against 
thee  seven  times  in  the  day,  and  seven  times  turn  again 
to  thee,  saying,  I  repent;  thou  shalt  forgive  him." 
Now  here  is  the  same  idea  that  we  have  in  Matthew, 
and  it  is  likely  that  the  account  in  Matthew  is  only  a 
development  of  this.  For  these  words  of  Matthew  are 
not  probable  in  the  mouth  of  Jesus  ;  they  do  not  have 
the  right  ring  to  them  ;  they  point  to  a  period  when 
the  Church  and  Church  government  were  in  existence  ; 
they  have  all  the  appearance  of  ecclesiastical  rules. 
The  Evangelist  gives  them  as  a  definite  application  of 
Jesus'  words  ;  and  then,  led  by  the  idea  of  Church  au- 
thority, he  adds  a  sentence  which  really  was  spoken  to 
Peter,  ' '  Whatsoever  ye  shall  bind  on  earth  shall  be 
bound  in  heaven  ;  and  whatsoever  ye  shall  loose  on 
earth  shall  be  loosed  in  heaven."  But  although  the 
first  Evangelist  does  not  retain  the  original  form  of  the 
saying  about  forgiveness,  he  does  retain  something 
which  points  to  it.  For  just  below  he  tells  us  how 
Peter  came  to  Jesus  and  asked  him,  "  I,ord,  how  often 
shall  my  brother  sin  against  me  and  I  forgive  him  ? 
till  seven  times?  "  So  that  from  Matthew  and  lyuke 
together  we  can  reconstruct  the  whole  incident.  Jesus 
had  said.  If  thy  brother  sin  against  thee  seven  times  in 


54         The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

a  day,  and  seven  times  repent,  thou  shalt  forgive  him. 
A  little  while  after  Peter  comes  to  him  and  asks,  Lord, 
did  you  mean  that  we  only  need  forgive  seven  times  ? 
After  that  saying,  "  If  he  trespass  against  thee  seven 
times  in  a  day,  thou  shalt  forgive  him,"  when  we  try 
further  to  reconstruct  the  passage  in  the  source,  for  a 
moment  we  are  at  a  loss.  For  Luke  goes  on,  "And 
the  Apostles  said  unto  the  Lord,  Increase  our  faith. 
And  the  Lord  said,  If  ye  have  faith  as  a  grain  of 
mustard  seed,  ye  would  say  unto  this  sycamine  tree. 
Be  thou  rooted  up,  and  be  thou  planted  in  the  sea ; 
and  it  would  have  obeyed  you."  Of  this,  however, 
Matthew  has  nothing.  Instead  he  goes  on  without 
any  break,  "  Again  I  say  unto  you,  that  if  two  of  you 
shall  agree  on  earth  as  touching  anything  that  they 
shall  ask,  it  shall  be  done  for  them  of  my  Father  which 
is  in  heaven.  For  where  two  or  three  are  gathered 
together  in  my  name,  there  am  I  in  the  midst  of  them. ' ' 
Then  comes  Peter's  question,  and  Jesus'  answer  in  the 
parable  of  the  debtors.  But  here  Mark  comes  in  to 
help  us ;  that  saying  about  the  sycamine  tree  he  has 
used,  with  its  form  slightly  changed,  in  the  account  of 
the  barren  fig-tree,  and  after  it  he  has  added  two  verses. 
"Therefore  I  say  unto  you.  All  things  whatsoever  5'e 
pray  and  ask  for,  believe  that  ye  have  received  them, 
and  ye  shall  have  them.  And  whensoever  ye  stand 
praying,  forgive,  if  ye  have  aught  against  any  one ; 
that  your  Father  which  is  in  heaven  may  forgive  yoyx 
your  trespasses."  '  But  these  are  exactly  the  two 
ideas,  given  partly  in  the  same  words,  that  we  find  in 
Matthew,  the  potency  of  prayer,  and  the  duty  of  for- 
giveness.    Mark  has  evidently  abbreviated  the  passage 

*  Mk.  II :  23-25. 


The  Synoptic  Gospels.  55 

from  the  source,  and  it  is  very  significant  that  he  gives 
us  just  the  three  thoughts,  in  the  same  order,  which 
we  should  get  independently  by  combining  the  ac- 
counts in  Luke  and  Matthew.  And  even  the  parable 
with  which  I^uke  closes,'  a  parable  which  he  must  have 
got  from  some  other  source,  shows  enough  likeness  to 
the  parable  of  the  debtors  to  explain  how  Luke  thought 
of  putting  it  here. 

Now  this  passage  shows,  we  think,  in  a  concrete 
way,  every  process  which  we  have  assumed  ;  it  shows 
that  Matthew  and  Luke  have  made  use  of  Mark,  and 
it  shows  that  all  of  our  Gospels  alike  have  made  use  of 
a  common  source,  which  still  can  be  detected  at  the 
bottom  of  them.  And  when  now  we  go  further,  and 
ask  how  extensive  a  use  Mark,  our  earliest  Gospel, 
has  made  of  this  source,  we  think  that  we  shall  be  able 
to  reach  results  that  are  a  little  surprising.  First  there 
are  the  sayings  of  Jesus  which  Mark  has,  and  which 
he  must  have  got  in  this  way.  He  often  puts  these 
sayings,  indeed,  in  new  combinations,  but  with  a  very 
few  exceptions,  which  perhaps  he  got  from  oral  tradi- 
tion, every  one  of  them  can  be  traced  back  to  a  prob- 
able, oftentimes  to  a  certain  connection  in  the  source.^ 
And  the  same  thing  is  true  of  a  surprisingly  large 
number  of  the  narratives.  Matthew  and  Luke  both 
show  that  they  are  dependent  on  Mark,  but  there  are 
also  indications,  not  so  numerous,  indeed,  but  still  to 
be  detected,  that  Mark  also  is  secondary,  that  Matthew 
and  Luke  sometimes  have  retained  the  original  reading. 
In  the  account  of  John  the  Baptist  and  of  Jesus'  tempta- 
tion this  is  very  plain  ;  let  us  look  at  some  of  the  cases 


1  Luke  17  •."]  ff. 
"  See  Appendix. 


56         The  Life  and  Teachmgs  of  Jestis. 

where  it  is  not  so  evident.  To  begin  with,  there  are 
four  miracle  stories  which  are  given  by  Matthew  in  a 
ver)^  much  simpler  form  than  that  in  which  Mark  gives 
them,  the  miracles  of  the  palsied  man,'  the  Gadarene," 
Jarius'  daughter,'  and  the  epileptic  boy."  In  Matthew 
these  stories  do  not  bear  the  marks  of  having  been 
abridged,  and  indeed  the  very  fact  that  they  are  so 
much  shorter  and  simpler  would  show  that  they  are 
more  original.  Tradition  does  not  proceed  from  the 
elaborate  to  the  simple,  but  from  the  simple  to  what  is 
more  elaborate.  Nor  are  special  indications  lacking  of 
the  secondary  character  of  Mark's  additions.  In  the 
story  of  the  paralytic,  the  faith  which  in  the  earlier  ac- 
count Jesus  commends  consists  in  the  fact  that  the  sick 
man  was  brought,  bed  and  all.  The  change  which 
Mark  introduces,  and  the  whole  incident  of  the  open- 
ing in  the  roof,  has  always  excited  suspicion,  and  it 
becomes  doubly  suspicious  when  we  notice  that  the 
incident  is  closely  connected  with  Mark's  pragmatism. 
Mark  is  constantly  insisting  upon  the  crowds  which 
followed  Jesus,  and  this  appears  to  be  the  motive  for 
his  change  ;  not  so  much  to  give  a  picture  of  faith  as 
to  show  Jesus  with  so  many  hearers  about  him  that  ap- 
proach to  him  is  impossible.  Again,  in  the  story  of 
the  Gadarene,  Mark  appears  at  a  disadvantage  ;  for  it 
is  less  likely  that  a  writer  who  had  a  good  explanafion 
before  him  should  change  it  into  a  poor  one,  than 
that,  finding  in  his  narrative  that  two  demons  were 
made  to  destroy  a  whole  herd,  and  not  understanding 
how  this  could  be,  he  should  conjecture  that  a  legion 


'  Mk.  2  :  \ff.  ;  Matt.  9  :  \ff. 
'  Mk.  5:1//.  ;  Matt.  8  :  2%//. 
8Mk.  5  :  21/f.  ;  Matt.  9  :  iS/f. 
<Mk.  9 : 1/^//. ;  Matt.  17  :  i\//. 


The  Synoptic  Gospels.  57 

of  demons  had  entered  into  a  single  man,  one  for  each 
of  the  swine.  And  another  secondary  trait  appears  in 
the  healing  of  the  issue  of  blood,  where  Mark  retains 
the  words  which  effect  the  cure  just  as  they  stand  in 
Matthew,  but  at  the  same  time  makes  the  cure  to 
have  taken  place  before  the  words  are  spoken.  And 
that  the  stories  really  were  in  the  source,  and  that 
Mark  found  them  there,  is  further  shown  by  the  fact 
that  in  all  of  them  I^uke  has  points  of  contact  with 
Matthew's  narrative,  while  in  one  of  them,  the  cure 
of  the  epileptic  boy,  he  clearly  agrees  throughout  with 
Matthew  rather  than  with  Mark. 

Next  let  us  take  the  two  Sabbath  controversies,  and 
first  the  story  of  the  plucking  of  grain  on  the  Sabbath 
day.  Here  also  Matthew  and  I^uke  agree  in  opposition 
to  Mark,  Not  to  speak  of  several  minor  points  of  con- 
tact in  the  language,  both  omit  the  saying  which  Mark 
gives,  "  The  Sabbath  was  made  for  man,  and  not  man 
for  the  Sabbath, ' '  and  both  disagree  with  Mark  as  to 
the  cause  of  the  controversy.  "The  disciples  were  an 
hungred, ' '  says  Matthew,  ' '  and  began  to  pluck  the 
ears  of  com  and  to  eat ' '  ;  and  I^uke  has  the  same  idea 
of  it.  But  Mark  says  nothing  about  their  eating,  and 
makes  the  offence  consist  in  breaking  a  path  through 
the  fields,  though  the  illustration  which  Jesus  uses,  if 
nothing  else,  would  make  it  evident  that  the  other 
version  is  in  the  right.  The  story  of  the  withered 
hand,  again,  seems  to  have  had  a  curious  history.  The 
story,  substantially  as  Matthew  gives  it,  is  shown  to 
have  been  in  the  source  by  its  presence  in  I^uke, '  with 
only   its  setting  changed,    and    the    withered    hand 

altered  to  dropsy.     Mark's  narrative  then  can  hardly 

•  • 

'  I^uke  \\\xff. 


58         The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

be  anything  else  than  his  version  of  the  same  story, 
for  the  entire  framework  of  the  incident,  apart  from 
Jesus'  words,  is  identical  in  the  two  Evangelists. 
Mark,  probably  because  he  is  more  interested  in  the 
illustration  which  it  affords  of  the  Pharisees'  hostility 
than  in  anything  else,  drops  Jesus'  reply,  and  instead 
of  the  Pharisees'  question,  he  makes  Jesus  ask  a  ques- 
tion which  is  somewhat  similar  to  it  in  phraseologJ^ 
When  Matthew  comes  to  this  story  in  Mark,  he  rec- 
ognizes it,  and  substitutes  the  account  in  the  source. 
Ivuke,  however,  thinks  they  are  two  events,  and  gives 
both.  Only  the  withered  hand  has  got  changed  into 
the  dropsy — lack  of  moisture  vs.  excess  of  it ; — and 
while  the  question  is  given  as  in  the  source,  "Is  it 
permitted  to  heal  on  the  Sabbath  ?  "  it  is  attributed 
through  the  influence  of  Mark's  account  to  Jesus, 
instead  of  to  his  opponents. 

Next  comes  the  story  of  the  miraculous  feeding, 
and  this  too  Mark  appears  to  have  found  in  his  source. 
Not  only  are  there  a  number  of  points  in  the  language 
where  Matthew  and  I^uke  agree,'  but  this  seems  to  be 
the  easiest  way  of  accounting  for  the  fact  that  two 
versions  are  given  of  the  same  event.  If  Mark  had 
found  one  account  in  writing,  and  from  some  other 
source  had  got  the  story  in  a  slightly  different  form, 
he  might  have  thought  that  they  referred  to  two 
distinct  events ;  otherwise  there  is  no  good  reason  why 
he  should  have  thought  this.  In  the  story  of  the 
transfiguration,  too,  Mark's  account  seems  to  be 
secondary,  and  in  several  minute  ways  Luke  shows  an 
agreement  with  Matthew.  In  both  while  Peter  is  yet 
speaki7ig  a  cloud  overshadows  them,  and  a  voice  comes 

'  See  Appendix. 


The  Synoptic  Gospels.  59 

from  the  cloud  ;  in  I^uke  it  is  the  cloud,  in  Matthew, 
more  naturally,  the  voice,  which  excites  the  alarm  of 
the  disciples.  But  both  dififer  from  Mark,  who  thinks 
that  the  fear  is  excited  by  the  vision  of  the  two  men, 
and  who  makes  Peter's  words  the  result  of  this  fear,  a 
thing  which,  apart  from  the  agreement  of  Matthew 
and  lyuke,  appears  like  a  misapprehension  ;  for  in  the 
words  themselves  there  is  nothing  to  suggest  that  they 
are  the  result  of  fright,  and  on  the  contrary,  Peter's 
expression,  "  I,ord,  it  's  a  good  thing  that  we  are 
here,"  is  quite  in  line  with  his  assertive  and  self- 
confident  character.  And  in  addition,  the  statement 
which  all  the  Evangelists  have,  "  I^ooking  round  about, 
they  saw  no  one,  save  Jesus  only,"  comes  in  more 
naturally  in  Matthew,  where  the  disciples  in  their 
fear  have  thrown  themselves  with  their  faces  to  the 
ground,  and  so  for  the  moment  have  not  been 
looking. 

And  now,  after  all  this,  we  should  not  expect  the 
concluding  history  of  the  Passion  to  be  wholly  inde- 
pendent, and,  in  fact,  we  find  indications  that  it  is  not 
so,  indications  which  in  themselves  are  perhaps  not 
always  very  strong,  but  which  are  stronger  when  they 
are  taken  all  together.  These  begin  with  the  story  of 
the  entry  into  Jerusalem,  where  Matthew  and  lyuke  both 
have  a  saying  of  Jesus'  in  answer  to  a  complaint  on  the 
part  of  the  Pharisees.'  These  sayings  are  not  the 
same,  but  they  are  similar,  and  it  is  more  likely  that 
the  presence  of  one  of  them  should  have  suggested  the 
other,  than  that,  with  nothing  to  suggest  it,  both 
Evangelists,  having  so  little  original  knowledge  as 
they  seem  to  have,  should  have  brought  in  a  similar 


'  Matt.  21 :  16  ;  I,uke  19  :  40. 


6o         The  Life  and  Teachings  of  fesus. 

saying  in  the  same  narrative.  Besides  this,  both  ac- 
counts make  the  cleansing  of  the  Temple  take  place  on 
the  day  of  the  entry,  while  Mark  postpones  it  to  the 
following  day ;  and  the  account  of  the  answer  which 
Jesus  gave  to  his  opponents  when  they  asked  him  his 
authority,'  an  account  in  which  there  are  several 
points  of  contact  between  Matthew  and  I^uke,  has  a 
close  connection  with  this  cleansing. 

Another  indication  occurs  in  the  stoiy  of  the  prepa- 
rations for  the  last  supper.  While  Mark  tells  minutely 
how  Jesus  gave  directions  to  his  disciples  to  go  into 
the  city  till  they  should  meet  a  man  bearing  a  pitcher 
of  water,  and  then  to  follow  him  and  address  the  owner 
of  the  house  where  he  should  enter — plainly  the  ac- 
count of  a  miracle, — Matthew  simply  reads,  "  Go  into 
the  city  to  such  a  man,"  which  seems  to  be  original, 
for  the  first  Evangelist  never  abbreviates  a  longer  ac- 
count in  a  way  like  this,  particularly  if  by  doing  so  he 
lets  go  the  chance  to  relate  a  miracle.  Then,  in  the 
story  of  Gethsemane,  Matthew  and  I^uke  both  have  the 
form,  "Thy  will  be  done,"  while  Mark  only  has  "  Not 
what  I  will,  but  what  thou  wilt  "  ;  this  might,  how- 
ever, be  due  to  a  reminiscence  of  the  L,ord's  Prayer. 
But  in  the  account  of  the  denial  the  coincidences  are 
stronger.  In  both  Matthew  and  lyuke  the  prophecy 
reads,  ' '  Before  the  cock  crow, ' '  while  Mark  has  ' '  Be- 
fore the  cock  crow  twice."  Both  add  the  sentence, 
"And  Peter  went  out  and  wept  bitterly."  Again,  in 
Mark  Peter  is  questioned  the  second  time  by  the  maid 
who  spoke  to  him  at  first,  while  in  Luke  it  is  another 
man  ;  so  that  the  "  other  maid,"  whom  the  first  Evan- 
gelist speaks  of,  may  possibly  be  a  compromise  between 

'  Matt.  21 :  23. 


The  Synopizc  Gospels.  6i 

the  two.  Then,  according  to  Mark,  Jesus  says  to  his 
judges,  "Ye  shall  see  the  Son  of  man  sitting  at  the 
right  hand  of  power,  and  coming  with  the  clouds  of 
heaven."  Such  a  saying  is  a  little  suspicious,  particu- 
larly as  Jesus  hardly  could  sit  at  the  right  hand  of 
power,  and  come  with  the  clouds  of  heaven  at  the 
same  time,  which  seems  to  be  intended.  Matthew, 
again,  has  it,  "  Henceforth  ye  shall  see  the  Son  of 
man  sitting  at  the  right  hand  of  power,  and  coming  on 
the  clouds  of  heaven,"  which  does  not  make  good 
sense.  But  in  L,uke  we  find,  "But  from  henceforth 
shall  the  Son  of  man  be  seated  at  the  right  hand  of  the 
power  of  God. ' '  If  this  was  the  form  in  the  source, 
which  Luke  has  been  the  only  one  to  retain,  it  explains 
at  once  how  Mark's  misunderstanding  arose,  and  how 
the  first  Evangelist  got  his  "henceforth,"  which  other- 
wise cannot  very  well  be  explained.  In  the  closely 
connected  account  of  the  mocking  of  Jesus,  also,  Mat- 
thew and  lyuke  both  have  the  question,  "  Who  is  he 
that  smote  thee  ? ' '  And,  in  conclusion,  there  are  a 
number  of  other  verbal  coincidences  between  Matthew 
and  L/uke.' 

And  not  only  has  Mark  taken  all  his  most  important 
incidents  from  the  source,  but  even  in  the  narratives 
which  are  due  to  himself  he  shows  his  dependence  on 
the  source  in  a  remarkable  way.  To  take  for  the  pres- 
ent only  the  most  striking  example  of  this,  in  Matthew 


'  rjvXit^Ero,  Luke  21  :  37,  cf.  Matt.  21  :  17  ;  hitirakEv,  Luke 
22  :  50,  cf.  Matt.  26  :  51 ;  omission  of  Mk.  14  :  51  and  15  :  44  ;  ual 
i6Tr}KEi  6  Xabz  OEcopcSv  and  rov  Qsov,  Luke  23 :  35,  cf.  Matt. 
27  :  36,  40 ;  evervXiZsv,  Luke  23  :  53,  c/.  Matt.  27  :  59  ;  ov  ovh 
r/v  ovSei'i  ovTCeo  jcsi^svo?,  Luke  23  153,  cf.  Matt.  27  :  60  ;  eTts- 
q)Go6KEi',  Luke  23  :  54,  cf.  Matt.  28  :  i  ;  ddrpaTCrovdy,  Luke 
24 : 4,  cf.  Matt.  28  : 3. 


62         The  Life  a7id  Teachings  of  Jesus. 


there  is  connected  with  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  a 
short  introduction  and  conclusion,  nearly  every  sen- 
tence of  which  has  its  counterpart  in  Mark. 


And  Jesus  went  about  in  all 
Galilee,  teaching  iu  their 
synagogues,  and  preaching 
the  Gospel  of  the  kingdom, 
and  healing  all  manner  of 
disease  and  all  manner  of 
sickness  among  the  people. 


And  the  report  of  him  went 
forth  into  all  Syria  : 


and  they  brought  unto  him  all 
that  were  sick,  holden  with 
divers  diseases,  and  torments, 
possessed  with  demons,  and 
epileptic  and  palsied  ;  and  he 
healed  them. 


And  there  followed  him 
great  multitudes  from  Galilee, 
and  Decapolis,  and  Jerusalem 
and  Judaea,  and  from  beyond 
Jordan. 

And  seeing  the  multitudes, 
he   went  up   into  the  moun- 


Jesus  came  into  Galilee, 
preaching  the  Gospel  of  God. 
Mk.  I  :  14,  15. 

And  straightway  on  the 
Sabbath  day  he  entered  into 
the  synagogue,  and  taught. 
I  :  21. 

And  he  went  into  their 
synagogues  throughout  all 
Galilee,  preaching  and  casting 
out  devils,     i  :  39. 

And  the  report  of  him  went 
out  straightway  everywhere 
into  all  the  region  of  Galilee 
round  about,     i  :  28. 

They  brought  unto  him  all 
that  were  sick,  and  them  that 
were  possessed  with  demons, 
and  he  healed 
many  that  were  sick  with 
divers  diseases,     i  :  32-34. 

He  healed  many,  insomuch 
that  as  many  as  had  plagues 
pressed  upon  him  that  they 
might  touch  him.     3  :  10. 

And  a  great  multitude  from 
Galilee  followed,  and  from 
Jerusalem,  and  from  Idumaea 
and  beyond  Jordan,  and  about 
Tyre  and  Sidon.     3:7/ 

And  he  goeth  up  into  the 
mountain,    and    calleth   unto 


The  Synoptic  Gospels.  63 

tain  :  and  when  he  had  sat  him  ■whom  he  himself  would, 
down,  his  disciples  came  unto  and  they  went  unto  him.  3  : 
him.  13- 

And  it  came  to  pass  when  And  they   were   astonished 

Jesus  ended  these  words,  the       at  his  teaching,  for  he  taught 
multitudes  were  astonished  at      them  as  having  authority,  and 
his  teaching  :    for  he  taught      not  as  the  scribes,     i  :  22. 
them  as  one  having  authority, 
and  not  as  the  scribes.     Matt. 
4:  23-5  ;  I  :  7  :  28,  29. 

It  is  evident  from  this  comparison  that  there  is  a  di- 
rect literary  connection  between  this  passage  and 
Mark's  Gospel,  and  there  are  two  wa3^s  in  which  the 
connection  might  have  arisen.  Our  first  Evangelist, 
wishing  to  form  an  introduction  to  his  account,  may- 
have  gone  through  Mark,  and  have  picked  out  these 
passages  and  put  them  together  ;  or,  on  the  other  hand, 
Mark  may  have  found  the  passage  in  his  source,  and 
may  have  used  it  in  a  certain  way  as  a  basis  for  his 
representation.  Something  is  to  be  said  for  the  first 
view,  but  much  more,  we  think,  for  the  second.  Let 
us  take  some  of  the  sentences  by  themselves.  ' '  The 
report  of  him  went  abroad  into  all  the  region  round 
about"  ;  this  certainly  would  follow  from  Matthew's 
account,  but  in  Mark  not  only  is  the  single  modest 
miracle  not  so  likely  to  have  attained  this  fame,  but  the 
sentence  does  not  come  in  naturally.  After  it  we  should 
expect  the  narrative  to  stop,  but  instead  of  this  it  goes 
on  to  describe  the  other  events  of  the  same  day ;  in 
other  words,  the  saying  interrupts  a  continuous  narra- 
tive to  speak  of  something  that  only  occurred  after  the 
events  of  this  narrative  were  finished.  Then  the  de- 
scription of  Jesus'  teaching, ' '  He  taught  them  as  having 
authority,  and  not  as  the  scribes, ' '  is  peculiarly  appro- 


64         The  Life  and  Teachings  of  fesus, 

priate  after  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  from  which  one 
gets  just  this  impression  very  vividly  ;  while  in  a  sim- 
ple statement  that  Jesus  taught  in  the  synagogue,  there 
is  nothing  especially  to  suggest  it.  And  closely  con- 
nected with  this,  ' '  The  multitudes  were  astonished  at 
his  teaching,"  goes  the  statement  of  the  crowds  which 
followed  Jesus  ;  in  Mark,  however,  this  statement  is 
connected  with  the  choice  of  the  Apostles,  where  the 
crowds  are  rather  in  the  way,  and  where  we  are  not 
told  just  how  they  were  disposed  of  while  Jesus  was 
upon  the  mountain.  Again,  in  Mark  the  description 
of  Jesus'  choice  of  the  Apostles  is  not  quite  natural, 
"  He  goeth  into  the  mountain,  and  calleth  unto  him 
whom  he  himself  would,  and  they  went  unto  him." 
Whom  did  he  send  after  them  ?  Why  did  he  not  bring 
them  with  him?  In  Matthew,  however,  the  words  read 
much  more  naturally.  And  with  this  conclusion  there 
are  other  things  that  agree.  lyuke  also  opens  his  ac- 
count of  Jesus'  ministry  with  a  short  passage,  which  is 
an  abridgment  of  the  passage  in  Matthew,'  and  he 
therefore  must  have  found  this  in  his  source  ;  for  that 
both  Evangelists  should  have  made  the  same  combina- 
tion of  passages  from  Mark,  and  that  Luke  should  have 
done  this  when  he  goes  on  to  repeat  the  passages  again 
in  the  connection  in  which  Mark  gives  them,  and  when 
an  introduction  was  ready  to  his  hand  from  Mark,  is 
decidedly  improbable.  Luke,  again,  when  he  comes 
to  the  account  in  Mark  of  the  choosing  of  the  Twelve, 
takes  that  occasion  to  bring  in  the  Sermon  on  the 
Mount.  More  than  that,  he  changes  the  order 
in  Mark,  and,  contrary  to  Mark,  he  gives  the 
names     of     the    Apostles    first,     and    then    brings 

'  Ivuke  4 :  14, 15 


The  Synoptic  Gospels.  65 

in  the  description  of  Jesus'  cures  as  an  introduction  to 
the  Sermon.  Some  such  introduction  he  must  there- 
fore have  known  in  the  source  from  which  the  Sermon 
was  derived.  And  finally,  Mark  shows  that  other 
things  at  least  he  has  borrowed  to  make  up  his  narra- 
tive. The  words  by  which  Jesus  is  made  to  announce 
his  ministry  are  those  which  John  the  Baptist  uses, 
and  the  words  of  the  demoniac,  ' '  What  have  we  to  do 
with  thee  ?  ' '  are  also  found  in  the  account  which  the 
source  gives  of  two  demoniacs.  '  Where  they  are  the 
most  likely  to  be  original  is  evident. 

This  therefore  is  the  conclusion  to  which  we  have 
come,  that  back  of  all  our  Gospels  there  lies  a  single 
common  source,  which  still  can  be  restored  within  cer- 
tain limits  by  comparing  carefully  passages  in  our  Gos- 
pels which  are  parallel.  The  author  of  Mark,  the  first 
of  our  present  Gospels,  had  this  before  him,  and  used 
it  as  a  mine  from  which  to  draw  the  material  which  he 
needed  for  his  purpose.  After  him  came  the  other  two 
Evangelists,  who,  with  two  books  now  in  their  posses- 
sion, attempted,  each  in  his  own  way  and  with  his  own 
end  in  view,  to  combine  them  into  a  single  narrative, 
adding  besides  a  certain  amount  of  other  matter.  But 
what  bearing  does  this  have  upon  the  authorship  of 
the  books  ?  The  earliest  tradition  which  we  have  about 
the  authors  is  due  to  Papias,  who  gives  it  in  these 
words : 

Mark,  having  become  the  interpreter  of  Peter,  wrote  down 
accurately  whatsoever  he  remembered.  It  was  not,  however, 
in  exact  order  that  he  related  the  sayings  or  deeds  of  Christ. 
For  he  neither  heard  the  Lord  nor  accompanied  him.  But  after- 
wards, as  I  said,  he  accompanied  Peter,  who  accommodated  his 

'  Matt.  8  :   29. 


66         The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesiis. 


instructions  to  the  necessities  of  his  hearers,  but  with  no  inten- 
tion of  giving  a  regular  narrative  of  the  Lord's  sayings.  Where- 
fore Mark  made  no  mistake  in  thus  writing  some  things 
as  he  remembered  them.  For  of  one  thing  he  took  especial 
care,  not  to  omit  anything  he  had  heard,  and  not  to  put  any- 
thing fictitious  into  the  statements.  Matthew  put  together  the 
sayings  of  the  Lord  in  the  Hebrew  language,  and  each  one  in- 
terpreted them  as  best  he  could. 

Must  we  then  give  this  early  source  which  has  been 
discovered  to  Matthew  the  Apostle?  Granting  that 
the  tradition  has  some  basis  to  it,  this  nevertheless  can 
scarcely  be  insisted  on,  when  we  call  to  mind  how  our 
Gospels  arose.  The  preceding  analysis  points  to  a 
somewhat  informal  and  haphazard  origin  of  the  Gospel 
tradition,  a  gradual  accretion  about  an  original  nucleus, 
each  new  editor  or  author  adding  a  little  something 
that  was  new,  and  leaving  a  more  or  less  deep  impress 
of  his  own  peculiarities  on  the  whole.  We  have  I^uke's 
testimony  that  Gospel  writing  was  not  considered  the 
peculiar  prerogative  of  an  eye-witness,  but  that 
' '  many ' '  before  his  time  had  tried  their  hand  at  it. 
Under  these  circumstances  it  would  be  extremely  haz- 
ardous to  assign  the  Gospels  in  their  final  stage  of 
development  to  any  special  person  designated  by  tradi- 
tion. When  we  have  got  back  as  far  as  our  data  will 
permit,  we  scarcely  have  arrived  at  the  Apostle  Mat- 
thew, though  some  such  a  document  as  is  attributed  to 
Matthew  must  lie  at  the  foundation  of  it  all,  if  we  are 
to  account  for  the  surprising  accuracy  with  which 
many  of  the  sayings  of  Jestis  are  preserved.  But 
while,  if  Papias'  statement  is  reliable,  Matthew's  work 
was  a  collection  of  sayings,  or  logia,  the  source  which 
our  Gospels  used  contained  a  very  considerable  amount 
of  historical  matter  as  well,  and  this,  as  will  be  shown, 


The  Synoptic  Gospels.  67 

is  not  always  reliable  enough  to  be  the  work  of  an 
Apostle.  Indeed  we  sometimes  can  see  traces  of  more 
hands  than  one.  In  two  discourses  of  a  less  authentic 
character,  earlier  discourses  have  been  made  use  of  ; 
and  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  which,  as  its  contents 
show,  was  spoken  only  to  disciples,  the  writer  of  the 
introduction  to  it  has  understood  as  if  it  were  spoken 
to  the  multitudes.  Still  more  unsafe  is  it  to  attribute  the 
second  Gospel  to  the  companion  of  Peter.  Papias'  Mark 
gets  his  material  from  Peter,  and  writes  without  much 
reference  to  order  ;  our  Mark  derives  by  all  odds  the 
most  important  part  of  his  matter  from  written  sources, 
and  his  peculiarity  lies  just  here,  that  his  seems  to 
have  been  one  of  the  first  attempts  to  give  a  real  his- 
tory, a  systematic  narrative,  of  Jesus'  life.  This  is 
indeed  the  motive  for  his  book ;  the  facts  which  he  has 
found  strung  loosely  together  he  has  combined  to  form 
a  definite  picture.  For  this  picture  he  certainly  de- 
serves some  credit ;  but  also,  in  carrying  it  out,  he 
continually  is  showing  his  lack  of  accurate  knowledge, 
as  will  appear  more  in  detail  in  a  succeeding  chapter. 
This  of  course  leaves  open  the  question  of  Papias'  testi- 
mony. If  that  was  not  based  upon  an  erroneous  tradi- 
tion, then  either  the  Gospel  of  Mark  must  have 
disappeared,  or  else  it  must  already  have  been  incorpo- 
rated with  Matthew's  work  before  our  present  Gospels 
arose. 


'  Matt.  10 :  15  ;  Mk.  13  :  11. 


cs^^^: 


CHAPTER  II. 

THE   FOURTH   GOSPEIv. 

DR.  ABBOT,  not  long  ago,  is  reported  to  have  said, 
though  we  do  not  ourselves  recall  the  passage, 
that  the  question  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  and  its 
authorship  is  a  question  which  has  been  settled  these 
forty  years ;  and  in  saying  this.  Dr.  Abbot  is  only  voicing 
a  sentiment  which  is  very  widespread  indeed  among  re- 
ligious people  both  in  our  own  country  and  in  England. 
One  has  only  to  read  the  religious  newspapers  to  find 
that  this  is  so,  and  to  see  in  how  confident  a  fashion 
the  verdict  is  given,  as  if  the  whole  thing  had  been  dis- 
posed of  once  for  all.  Still  the  newspapers  may  per- 
haps be  pardoned  if  they  are  not  too  accurate  at  times 
in  matters  of  this  sort,  and  we  could  listen  to  them  with 
fairly  good  composure  ;  but  when  just  the  same  claim 
is  made  repeatedly  by  men  who  really  are  leaders  in 
Christian  thought,  and  who  are  deserving  of  admira- 
tion and  respect,  we  feel  that  we  have  the  right  to 
complain.  If  when  a  writer  uses  such  words  as  those 
of  Dr.  Abbot's  which  have  been  quoted,  he  means 
nothing  more  by  them  than  that  the  arguments  for  the 
genuineness  of  the  Gospel  are  so  strong  that  he  him- 
self has  been  convinced  by  them,  then  certainly  no  one 
ever  would  dream  of  denying  his  right  to  say  this  as 

68 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  69 

strongly  as  he  pleased.  But  to  say  that,  as  a  question 
among  scholars,  the  genuineness  of  the  Fourth  Gospel 
is  a  settled  question,  is  a  very  different  thing  indeed, 
and  it  never  would  be  said  by  one  who  had  taken 
impartial  account  of  the  literature  on  both  sides  of 
the  subject.  It  would  not  be  fair  to  claim,  on  the 
other  hand,  that  the  spuriousness  of  the  Gospel  is  a 
settled  question,  though  we  think  that  there  has  been 
a  tendency  in  this  direction,  of  which  the  change  of 
opinion  on  the  part  of  certain  German  critics  is  one 
significant  indication.  But  what  makes  us  disposed  to 
complain  of  such  a  claim  as  that  which  Dr.  Abbot 
makes,  is  not  so  much  the  fact  that  it  is  a  mistaken 
claim,  as  for  this  reason,  that  it  tends  to  increase  a  feel- 
ing about  the  Fourth  Gospel  which  is  a  most  unfor- 
tunate one,  and  because  in  itself  it  usually  is  an 
expression  of  this  feeling.  Of  the  Foirrth  Gospel  it 
is  true  in  a  peculiar  way,  as  it  is  not  true  of  any 
other  book  of  the  Bible,  that  it  has  become  a  test  ques- 
tion in  theology  rather  than  a  question  which  is  purely 
critical  and  historical.  If  one  is  concerned  for  religion, 
and  wishes  to  commend  himself  to  religious  people,  it 
is  almost  impossible  that  he  should  do  this  if  he  gives 
it  out  that  he  does  not  accept  the  Fourth  Gospel  as  the 
work  of  an  Apostle,  while  if  one  does  accept  it  firmly, 
this  is  enough,  as  has  been  shown  more  than  once  in 
recent  days,  to  cover  a  multitude  of  theological  sins. 
This,  we  say,  is  unfortunate,  and  the  more  important 
the  question  that  is  concerned  in  it,  the  more  unfor- 
tunate it  is.  That  a  critic  does  not  accept  the  Fourth 
Gospel  as  genuine  is  to  most  people  plain  proof  that  he 
simply  will  not  accept  it,  that  he  has  decided  before- 
hand that  the  Gospel  cannot  be  genuine,  and  now  is 
only  concerned  to  find  arguments  that  will  support  his 


yo         The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

decision  ;  so  that  when  the  question  continues  to  be 
raised,  it  is  not  strange  if  it  is  met  by  a  certain  feehng 
of  impatience,  as  if  a  stubborn  blindness  were  the  only 
thing  that  inspired  the  attempt.  And  with  this  opinion 
of  an  opponent,  it  is  hardly  possible  that  one  should  try 
very  seriously  to  imagine  to  himself  that  opponent's 
point  of  view.  At  the  same  time  we  do  not  deny  that 
this  is  a  natural  feeling  ;  on  the  contrary  it  is  wellnigh 
an  inevitable  one,  and  it  would  be  most  surprising  if 
such  a  feeling  did  not  exist.  For  the  Fourth  Gospel 
does  really  lie  at  the  centre  of  the  Bible,  and  more  than 
any  other  book  of  the  Bible  it  will  determine  what  the 
truth  of  the  Bible  history  really  is.  If  the  Fourth 
Gospel  is  not  genuine,  then  the  supernatural  concep- 
tion of  Jesus  which  the  Gospel  upholds  inevitably  will 
have  to  fall  away  with  it ;  and  if,  on  the  other  hand, 
the  Gospel  can  be  shown  to  be  the  work  of  the  Apostle 
John,  then  the  Apologists  are  right  when  they  claim 
that  really  it  carries  the  proof  of  the  miraculous  with 
it. 

But  in  saying  this,  we  wish  to  guard  ourselves  against 
a  retort  which  very  likely  will  occur  to  any  who  are  in- 
clined to  be  critical.  For,  they  will  say,  such  a  state- 
ment only  goes  to  indicate,  what  we  have  all  along 
maintained,  that  at  bottom  it  is  an  aversion  to  the 
miraculous  which  underlies  all  the  opposition  to  the 
Fourth  Gospel ;  it  is  the  perception  that  the  Gospel 
implies  the  miraculous  which  furnishes  the  sufficient 
proof  that  it  cannot  be  genuine.  That  we  should  con- 
vince any  one  that  it  is  not  a  fear  of  the  miracles  which, 
in  spite  of  the  real  difficulties  of  the  subject,  has  brought 
us  to  the  conclusion  which  we  have  reached,  we  have, 
we  confess,  but  little  hope.  Still  this  is  the  less  im- 
portant as  the  critic  who  rejects  the  Gospel  is  not  the 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  *j\ 

only  one  who  comes  with  his  prepossessions  to  the  in- 
quiry. Prof.  Sanday,  who  is  as  fair  an  opponent  as  one 
could  wish  to  meet,  said  not  very  long  ago,  if  we  recall 
him  rightly,  that  while  the  Old  Testament  problems 
are  not  of  such  a  nature  that  the  basis  of  our  faith  de- 
pends upon  the  way  in  which  they  may  be  settled,  the 
problem  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  diflFers  from  them  in  this. 
But  one  who  has  a  system  of  religious  belief  which  he 
wishes  to  retain,  and  which  depends  upon  the  question 
whether  a  book  was  written  by  a  certain  man,  surely 
will  not  come  to  that  book  without  his  prepossessions 
about  it,  nor  are  we  able  to  see  how  he  is  likely  to  be 
a  more  impartial  critic  than  the  man  who  takes  offence 
at  the  miracle  stories.  But  if  our  objection  to  the  Gos- 
pel is  based  upon  the  miraculous,  we  at  least  are  not 
aware  of  it.  When  we  came  to  the  book,  we  determined 
as  much  as  possible  to  set  aside  the  miraculous  elements, 
and  to  decide  the  question,  if  it  were  possible  to  decide 
it,  wholl}^  upon  other  grounds  ;  and  at  first,  indeed,  we 
were  strongly  inclined  to  accept  the  Gospel  as  genuine. 
But  there  were  other  things  also  which  we  found,  and 
these  at  last  compelled  us  to  do  what  we  had  much 
rather  not  have  done,  to  believe  that  the  Fourth  Gospel 
is  in  no  sense  the  work  of  the  Apostle  John  ;  and  the 
reasons  for  this  change  we  shall  now  give. 

When  we  pass  from  the  first  three  Gospels  to  the 
Fourth,  we  find  at  once  that  there  are  very  many  and 
very  obvious  differences  which  have  to  be  accounted 
for.  We  meet  with  new  persons  and  new  scenes,  and 
indeed  the  whole  framework  of  the  history  is  changed 
completely ;  and  even  in  those  narratives  which  are 
found  in  the  older  Gospels,  there  are  often  divergen- 
cies, some  of  them  slight  divergencies,  but  others  very 
important  ones.     Now  in  itself,  it  must  be  noticed,  the 


72  The  Life  and  Tcachi7igs  of  Jesus. 

fact  that  such  a  conflict  exists  does  not  prove  at  all  that 
the  F'ourth  Gospel  is  wrong,  and  it  might  even  tell  in 
its  favor.  To  one  who  knows  how  the  early  Gospels 
arose,  it  will  not  appear  strange  that  an  eye-witness 
should  find  many  things  to  correct  in  them  ;  and,  in 
fact,  whoever  did  not  find  things  to  correct  we  should 
saj'  at  once  could  not  have  been  an  eye-witness.  So 
that  when  John  contradicts  the  Synoptists,  we  cannot, 
to  start  with,  assume  that  John  is  wrong,  but  in  each 
case  we  must  ask  ourselves  which  account  in  itself  is 
most  likely  to  be  right ;  we  must  ask  whether  the 
changes  which  we  find  are  the  changes  which  an 
Apostle,  an  eye-witness,  would  have  been  likely  to 
make,  or  whether  there  is  some  other  way  in  which 
they  can  be  more  easily  explained. 

Let  us  begin  with  a  case  which,  however  it  may  be 
decided  at  last,  is  in  its  main  features  fairly  plain, 
the  healing  of  the  nobleman's  son,  in  the  fourth  chap- 
ter of  the  Gospel.  It  is  possible  that  this  narrative, 
and  the  narrative  of  the  centurion's  child  in  the  older 
Gospels,  may  refer  to  two  distinct  events.  It  is  pos- 
sible ;  but  when  we  notice  the  very  striking  resem- 
blances between  the  two  stories,  it  is  hard  to  get  rid  of 
the  suspicion  that  it  must  be  the  same  event  that  both 
relate.  Both  occur  at  the  beginning  of  the  ministry 
in  Galilee,  in  both  the  one  who  asks  for  help  is  a  man 
of  importance,  in  both  his  home  is  at  Capernaum,  in 
both  a  sick  child  is  cured,  in  both  the  boy  is  healed  at 
a  distance,  in  both  a  rebuke  to  the  Jews  is  implied. 
So  that,  while  we  admit  the  possibility,  we  do  not 
think  it  is  the  most  natural  thing,  to  suppose  that  two 
events  are  meant.  But  if  it  is  to  the  same  healing 
that  both  refer,  then  it  is  evident  that  there  are  feat- 
ures which  cannot  be  reconciled  with  each  other,  and 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  73 

in  the  case  of  the  most  important  diiference,  it  is  quite 
as  evident  that,  if  we  must  choose  between  the  two, 
the  earUer  account  has  all  the  marks  of  being  the  more 
original  one.  If  we  turn  to  this  account,  we  shall  find 
that  the  whole  story  centres  about  a  remarkable  say- 
ing of  the  centurion's,  a  saying  which  excited  the 
admiration  of  Jesus.  But  this  saying  John  does  not 
give,  and,  more  than  that,  he  directly  excludes  it. 
According  to  the  older  account,  Jesus  had  not  thought 
of  working  a  cure  at  a  distance,  and  it  is  the  faith  of 
the  centurion  which  suggests  this,  a  faith  which  Jesus 
contrasts  with  the  unbelief  of  his  own  countrymen. 
But  in  John  all  this  is  changed ;  here  the  nobleman 
himself  is  included  in  the  rebuke,  Jesus  of  his  own 
accord  performs  the  cure  at  a  distance,  and  the  noble- 
man, far  from  suggesting  it,  only  entreats  Jesus  to 
"come  down  ere  his  child  dies."  Here,  we  say,  if 
either  account  is  right,  it  is  far  more  likely  to  be  the 
older  one  ;  and  the  only  question  is,  How  are  we  to 
explain  the  difference  in  John's  narrative  ?  If  the 
narrative  is  really  John's,  if  it  is  the  narrative  of  an 
eye-witness,  then  the  only  way  in  which  it  can  be 
explained  is  to  suppose  that  there  has  been  a  confusion 
of  memory  ;  and  perhaps  it  would  not  be  safe  to  say 
that  this  is  impossible  to  suppose.  But  the  supposi- 
tion becomes  a  somewhat  dangerous  one  when  we 
remember  that  it  is  not  a  detail  of  no  importance 
which  John  has  forgotten,  but  the  very  point  of  the 
whole  story.  If  John  is  confused  here,  and  still  gives 
his  confused  recollections  so  circumstantially,  is  it  not 
likely  to  lessen  a  little  one's  confidence  in  his  accu- 
racy ?  And  even  if  it  is  possible  that  John  could  have 
forgotten  such  a  striking  thing,  yet  it  must  have  been 
recalled  to  him  if  he  had  ever  read  our  Synoptic  Gos- 


74  The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

pels,  as  it  seems  exceedingl}^  probable  that  he  had 
done.  Now  there  is  another  way  in  which  the  differ- 
ences might  be  accounted  for,  and  this  way  gets  rid 
of  the  difficulty  which  is  found  in  supposing  that 
there  has  been  a  slip  of  memor3^  The  aim  of  the 
Fourth  Gospel  is  to  glorify  Jesus ;  this  much  at  least 
is  certain,  whatever  the  means  may  be  that  are  taken 
to  do  it.  If  now  we  suppose  that  the  author  has  taken 
the  miracle  which  he  found  in  the  older  Gospels,  and, 
with  this  purpose  in  his  mind,  has  transformed  it  freely 
to  suit  himself,  we  have  a  supposition  which,  taking 
the  passage  alone,  will  explain  the  facts  at  least  in  a 
plausible  way.  This  will  account  for  the  difference 
which  already  has  been  dwelt  upon.  In  its  early  form 
the  miracle  is  not  a  glorification  of  Jesus  so  much  as  it 
is  a  glorification  of  the  centurion,  and  if  one  wished  to 
exalt  Jesus'  share  in  it,  he  would  be  likely  to  do  much 
as  we  find  in  the  Fourth  Gospel  has  actually  been  done  ; 
he  would  make  Jesus  the  one  to  propose  the  distant 
cure,  he  would  exalt  Jesus'  majesty  and  self-confi- 
dence, and  tone  down  the  centurion's  faith,  he  would 
make  it  seem  natural  and  customary'  that  Jesus  should 
command  in  this  way  the  powers  of  sickness,  instead 
of  its  being  necessar>^  for  the  sick  man  to  be  in  his 
presence,  as,  in  the  vast  majority  of  cases,  the  older 
Gospels  presuppose.  And  the  other  features  of  the 
s\.oxy  fit  in  curiously  with  this  explanation.  There  is, 
for  instance,  the  place  at  which  the  miracle  happened, 
at  Cana,  according  to  John,  while  the  other  Gospels 
put  it  at  Capernaum.  It  might  be  that  the  old  account 
was  corrected  by  John,  but  it  is  not  quite  easy  to  see 
why  such  a  detail  as  this  should  have  dropped  out, 
while  it  is  ver}'^  easy  to  see  how,  if  one  wished  to 
heighten  the  account,  the  miracle  might  seem   a  little 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  75 

more  effective  if  the  distance  were  increased.  Just  the 
same  thing  is  true  of  the  conclusion  which  is  given  to 
the  account.  This  conclusion  is  not  found  in  the  older 
Gospels,  but  Matthew's  narrative  closes  with  these 
words,  ' '  And  the  child  was  healed  in  that  hour. ' '  Now 
if  the  writer  had  been  working  over  the  miracle  upon 
the  basis  of  the  old  account,  what  is  it  likely  that  he 
would  have  done  ?  Why  he  would  have  done  as  we 
find  has  really  been  done  in  the  Fourth  Gospel,  he 
would  have  shown  how  these  words  were  literally  true, 
how  the  very  moment  when  Jesus  spoke  was  the  mo- 
ment of  the  child's  recovery.  And  that  this  is  the  true 
explanation,  that  the  addition  is  not  history  at  all,  at 
least  one  thing  goes  to  show,  the  well-known  difficulty 
about  the  time  when  the  cure  was  performed.  Accord- 
ing to  John  this  was  about  one  o'clock  in  the  after- 
noon, and  yet,  although  the  servants  started  out  to 
meet  the  nobleman,  and  the  journey  was  a  short  one, 
it  was  not  till  the  next  day  that  he  learned  the  news. 
No  explanation  has  been  given  of  this  which  is  enough 
to  make  it  seem  natural,  and  we  do  not  think  that  any 
explanation  can  be  given  ;  but  if  we  account  for  the 
narrative  in  the  way  in  which  we  have  tried  to  account 
for  it,  then  no  explanation  will  be  necessary. 

Now  we  will  not  insist  that  this  waj-  of  accounting 
for  the  narrative  is  fixed  and  certain,  that  it  is  neces- 
sarily the  true  way.  If  the  difficulty  stood  alone  in  the 
Gospel,  if  there  were  nothing  more  which  pointed  to 
this  explanation,  then  we  should  say  that  undoubtedly 
it  was  not  the  true  way,  and  that  some  other  way  must 
be  found.  All  that  we  claim  is  that  it  is  a  plausible 
wa}^  that  taken  by  itself  it  is  even  the  most  plausible 
way  of  accounting  for  the  facts.  But  if  we  find  that 
there  are  other  incidents  in  the  Gospel  which  can  be 


76  The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jestis. 

accounted  for  in  the  same  way,  that  there  are  many 
such  incidents,  then  the  explanation  becomes  more 
than  a  possibility,  it  becomes  distinctly  probable.  Now 
there  are  other  things  in  the  Gospel  which,  if  they  do 
not  necessarily  demand  this  explanation,  at  least  fall  in 
with  it  very  readilj^  and  as  another  illustration  we  may 
take  the  very  next  miracle  that  is  recorded,  the  miracle 
of  the  man  at  the  pool  of  Bethesda.  Upon  the  diflScul- 
ties  in  the  miracle  itself  we  do  not  wish  to  dwell,  al- 
though there  are  some  features  of  it  which  are  a  little 
suspicious.  This  long  and  unsuccessful  waiting  at  a 
pool  with  miraculous  properties  is  not  altogether  easy 
to  imagine,  and  there  is  the  more  important  fact  that 
Jesus  volunteers  of  his  own  accord  to  heal  the  man, 
while  in  the  other  Gospels  he  is  accustomed  to  wait  till 
he  is  asked.  But  what  we  want  especially  to  point  out 
is  the  fact  that  here  too,  as  in  the  fonner  miracle,  there 
are  remarkable  points  of  contact  with  a  narrative  in 
the  Synoptic  Gospels,  the  narrative  of  the  paralytic 
borne  of  four.  Here  the  helplessness  of  the  man  and 
the  character  of  his  sickness  is  the  same,  the  command 
of  Jesus  and  the  result  which  followed  it  are  given  in 
just  the  same  words,  in  both  Jesus  assumes  that  the 
man's  sickness  is  due  to  sin,  and  both  give  rise  to  an 
accusation  of  blasphemy  on  the  part  of  the  Pharisees. 
Moreover  the  narrative  in  Matthew  is  closely  connected 
in  order  with  the  story  of  the  centurion's  child,  which 
also  precedes  it  in  John.  Now  to  understand  what  the 
force  of  our  argument  is,  it  is  necessarj^  not  to  take 
this  miracle  alone,  but  to  look  at  it  in  connection 
with  the  miracle  of  the  nobleman's  son  which  already 
has  been  considered.  Here  are  two  narratives  which 
agree  in  a  most  remarkable  way  with  two  correspond- 
ing narratives  in  the  older  Gospels.     Is  this  agreement 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  77 

an  accidental  one  ?  does  it  stand  for  nothing  ?  To  us 
it  is  not  possible  to  believe  this  ;  not  easy  to  believe  it 
in  the  case  of  the  first  miracle,  and  impossible  when 
we  put  the  two  together.  And  the  explanation  which 
in  the  first  miracle  we  thought  perhaps  was  conceiv- 
able, the  explanation  that  there  had  been  a  fault  of 
memory,  becomes  in  the  second  not  conceivable  at  all. 
So  that  again  we  are  led  to  conclude,  as  we  were  dis- 
posed to  conclude  before,  that  the  author  is  not  an  eye- 
witness, but  a  man  who  is  freely  using  and  changing 
over  stories  which  he  found  already  before  him  in 
writing. 

One  other  narrative  it  may  be  well  to  take  before 
going  through  the  Gospel  more  in  detail,  the  one 
which  tells  of  the  anointing  of  Jesus  at  Bethany. 
This  story  is  told  in  John  more  circumstantially  than 
it  is  told  in  the  Synoptic  Gospels  ;  Mary,  for  example, 
is  the  woman  who  anoints  Jesus,  and  Judas  is  the 
disciple  who  objects  to  the  waste  of  the  ointment. 
Now  this  may  go  to  show  that  John  has  a  better  knowl- 
edge of  the  event  than  the  older  narrators,  but  it  is 
just  as  possible  that  it  shows  something  very  different. 
Tradition  often  tends  to  give  definiteness  to  a  story,  to 
discover  names  and  add  details,  and  tradition  it  is  quite 
possible  has  been  at  work  here.  Indeed  it  is  rather 
easier  to  explain  how  unknown  persons  should  be  inden- 
tified  with  names  that  were  familiar,  than  to  explain  how, 
if  the  one  who  anointed  Jesus  was  a  well-known  follower 
of  his,  and  the  objecting  disciple  was  the  disciple  who, 
a  few  days  later,  proved  a  traitor,  facts  like  these  should 
come  to  be  lost  sight  of  in  the  earlier  account.  Then 
when  John  makes  the  ointment  a  full  pound  in  weight 
the  amount  certainly  is  extravagant,  and  the  words  of 
Jesus  by  which  he  commends  the  woman  are  much 


78  The  Life  and  Teachings  of  yesus. 


more  pointed  in  the  older  story.  But  the  difference 
which  is  most  significant  consists  in  this,  that  while  in 
the  Synoptic  Gospels  the  head  of  Jesus  is  anointed, 
John  makes  Mary  anoint  his  feet,  and  wipe  them  with 
the  hair  of  her  head.  Here  again  we  cannot  say 
absolutely  that  the  Fourth  Gospel  is  wrong.  Perhaps 
it  is  right.  Still  the  probabilitj'  seems  to  be  very 
much  against  it.  For  if  we  turn  to  the  seventh  chapter 
of  lyuke,  we  find  the  account  of  another  anointing 
which  bears  a  curious  resemblance  to  John's  narrative. 
A  woman,  we  are  told,  who  w^as  a  sinner,  came  and 
stood  at  Jesus'  feet  behind  him,  weeping,  and  began  to 
wash  his  feet  with  tears,  and  to  wipe  them  with  the 
hairs  of  her  head,  and  kissed  his  feet,  and  anointed 
them  with  the  ointment.  Now  the  evidence  for  this 
story  is  not  unfortunatel)^  of  the  best,  for  it  shows 
clearl}'  a  dependence  upon  other  narratives.  This  is 
true  of  the  incident  of  the  anointment,  which  we  think 
is  taken  from  the  anointing  at  Bethan)^  to  which  the 
name  of  the  host,  Simon,  is  also  due.  Then  again 
the  two  sentences  spoken  to  the  woman  are  taken,  the 
one  from  the  miracle  of  the  palsied  man,  and  the 
other  from  the  miracle  of  the  woman  with  an  issue  of 
blood,  and  the  forgiving  of  the  woman's  sins  also 
recalls  the  story  of  the  paralytic.  Besides  this,  Jesus' 
application  of  his  parable  is  a  little  confused,  a  sinful 
woman  would  hardly  have  been  likely  to  enter  a 
Pharisee's  house,  and  Jesus'  rebuke  is  harsh  when  we 
remember  that  he  was  enjoying  the  Pharisee's  hospi- 
tality. At  the  same  time  the  story  is  so  beautiful  and 
so  characteristic  that  we  should  be  glad  to  believe 
there  was  some  basis  for  it,  and  perhaps  the  parable 
reall}^  was  spoken  by  Jesus  to  defend  some  woman  who 
had  shown  an  unusual  token  of  her  gratitude.     But 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  79 

however  this  may  be,  the  story  in  I^uke  oflFers  an  easy 
way  of  explaining  how  John's  account  arose.  In 
I/Uke  the  woman  bends  over  Jesus,  weeping,  and  as 
some  of  her  tears  fall  on  his  feet,  she  brushes  them 
away  with  her  hair ;  and  this  is  not  unnatural.  But 
that  Mary  should  have  poured  ointment  on  his  feet, 
and  wiped  that  away  with  her  hair,  is  plainly  not  so 
natural,  so  that  John's  account  seems  to  be  a  secondary 
one,  and  his  confusion  must  have  been  due  to  lyuke. 
But  such  a  confusion  in  the  case  of  an  eye-witness  is 
hardly  possible,  and  it  points  rather  to  one  who  is 
drawing  his  facts  from  the  Gospels,  and  has  no  origi- 
nal knowledge  about  them  of  his  own. 

This  then  is  our  theory,  that  in  the  history  which 
he  gives,  our  author  is  taking  facts  which  he  has  found 
in  the  older  Gospels,  and  is  freely  using  these  facts, 
and  transforming  them,  sometimes,  so  that  they  shall 
suit  the  purpose  which  he  has  in  view.  Such  a  theory 
demands  more  proof  than  has  been  given  for  it  as  yet, 
and  so  we  shall  go  through  the  book  with  some  detail, 
and  shall  try  to  show  that  there  are  many  things  which 
seem  to  point  to  it.  And  first  we  will  begin  with  the 
story  of  John  the  Baptist.  This  account,  when  we 
first  look  at  it,  seems  to  be  very  different  from  the 
older  narrative.  There  is  the  deputation  from  the 
Sanhedrin,  and  John's  testimony  to  this  deputation, 
an  incident  in  itself  not  at  all  improbable,  although 
the  Synoptists  do  not  know  of  it.  Then  three 
times  John  bears  witness  to  Jesus  among  his  own 
disciples,  and  of  this  also  the  earlier  Gospels  know 
nothing.  And  what  the  earlier  Gospels  do  speak  of, 
the  Baptism  and  the  Temptation,  in  John  are  not  so 
much  as  hinted  at ;  whether  he  leaves  a  place  for  them 
at  all  is  a  somewhat  doubtful  question.      And  now 


8o  The  Life  and  Teachings  of  yestis. 

with  diflferences  such  as  these,  it  becomes  a  little 
strange  that  the  elements  of  John's  account,  very 
nearly  the  whole  of  them,  are  found  also  in  the  Synop- 
tists.  John  speaks  of  himself  as  a  "  voice  of  one  crjdng 
in  the  wilderness,"  and  this  quotation,  hardly  natural 
in  John's  own  mouth,  the  Evangelists  we  find  have 
already  applied  to  him.  He  bears  witness  before  the 
Pharisees  in  a  sentence  which,  in  the  older  accounts,  is 
addressed  to  the  people,  and  this  earlier  connection  we 
can  hardly  hesitate  to  say  is  the  more  correct  one. 
Then  again,  in  the  Synoptic  Gospels,  a  dove  appears 
to  Jesus  when  he  is  baptized,  and  a  voice  from  heaven 
attests  his  Messiahship  to  him, — an  experience  clearly 
of  Jesus'  own.  Now  the  Fourth  Gospel  has  this  in- 
cident, or  at  least  a  part  of  it,  but  here  the  experience 
does  not  come  to  Jesus  but  to  John  himself.  If  one 
feels  no  trouble  in  believing  that  the  dove  was  a  real 
appearance  "  in  bodily  form,"  of  course  it  will  not  be 
hard  for  him  to  explain  this  ;  but  if  he  finds  this  diffi- 
cult to  accept,  any  attempt  to  reconcile  John's  account 
with  the  other  one  brings  in  endless  complications. 
Then  in  addition  to  these  there  is  another  point  of 
contact  which  is  a  peculiarl)^  significant  one.  ' '  He  that 
cometh  after  me, "says  John,  "is  become  before  me, 
for  he  was  before  me,"  and  upon  this  testimony  a  good 
deal  of  emphasis  is  laid.  But  in  the  other  Gospels 
there  is  a  sentence  which  is  suggested  by  this  very 
strongly,  "  He  that  cometh  after  me  is  mightier  than 
I,  the  latchet  of  whose  shoes  I  am  not  worthy  to  stoop 
down  and  unloose."  No  doubt  it  is  possible  to  say 
that  these  are  two  difi"erent  sayings,  but  it  is  not  easy 
to  believe  that  this  is  so,  particularly  when  we  find 
that  the  testimony  is  brought  in  as  something  already 
well-known,  ' '  this  is  he  of  whom  I  said, ' '  and  that  in 


The  Fourth  Gospel. 


the  twenty-seventh  verse  John  practically  makes  the 
identification  himself.  But  to  suppose  that  an  Apostle 
should  have  altered  a  saying  in  so  arbitrary  a  way  as 
this  is  very  difficult  to  suppose  indeed. 

And  this  last  alteration  goes  along  with  two  other 
testimonies  to  Jesus  which  the  Fourth  Gospel  attributes 
to  the  Baptist,  one  of  them  the  saying,  "  Behold  the 
Lamb  of  God,  which  taketh  away  the  sin  of  the  world," 
and  the  other  the  long  speech  to  the  disciples  in  the 
third  chapter.  These  three  testimonies  have  all  of  them 
the  same  point  of  view  ;  Jesus  is  pre-existent,  he  comes 
down  from  heaven,  he  is,  in  the  theological  language 
of  the  book,  the  divine  Logos,  sent  into  the  world  for 
the  salvation  of  men.  Now  this  certainly  is  the  point 
of  view  of  the  Evangelist,  it  is  exactly  the  fashion  in 
which  he  speaks  of  Jesus  in  other  places ;  but  it  is 
most  improbable  that  a  metaphysical  belief  like  this 
was  held  by  the  Baptist.  John's  conception  of  the 
Messiah,  if  we  can  judge  from  his  sayings  in  the  Gos- 
pels, did  not  differ  radically  from  the  best  conceptions 
of  his  day  ;  to  him  the  Messiah  was  a  king,  a  con- 
queror, whose  task  it  was  to  lay  the  axe  to  the  root  of 
the  trees,  to  sift  the  chaff  from  the  wheat,  to  execute 
vengeance  upon  God's  enemies,  and  bring  about  the 
triumph  of  his  people.  And  from  a  view  like  this  to 
get  the  view  of  the  Fourth  Gospel,  it  is  not,  we  think, 
historically  possible  to  do,  for  the  two  sets  of  sayings 
show  an  altogether  different  type  of  mind.  And  closely 
connected  with  this,  there  is  another  point  in  which 
the  two  accounts  cannot  easily  be  made  to  agree. 
John,  after  his  imprisonment,  sent  to  Jesus  with  a 
question  about  his  Messiahship,  and  this  question 
makes  it  evident  that  there  was  a  doubt  upon  the 
matter  in  John's  mind.     But  while  we  can  understand 


82         The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jestis. 

how  John,  with  a  tendency  to  beHeve  that  Jesus  was 
the  Messiah,  afterwards  might  be  led  by  circumstances 
to  be  in  doubt  about  it,  we  cannot  understand  this  if 
John's  beHef  was  so  clear  and  definite  as  the  Fourth 
Gospel  makes  it  out  to  be.  If  a  divine  token  had  been 
revealed  to  John,  and  he  had  clearly  recognized  this 
token  in  Jesus,  if  again  and  again  he  had  borne  witness 
to  Jesus'  Messiahship  with  perfect  confidence,  if  his 
clearest  and  most  unequivocal  testimony  had  been 
given  after  Jesus  for  some  time  had  been  engaged  in  a 
ministry  which  did  not  in  the  least  point  to  a  visible 
and  temporal  kingdom,  then  John's  doubt  becomes 
very  strange,  and  we  do  not  think  that  it  can  be  natu- 
rall)^  explained.  And  still  one  thing  more,  if  John 
spoke  in  this  way,  how  is  it  that  John's  disciples  still 
held  aloof  from  Jesus,  that  "he  to  whom  John  bare 
witness  beyond  Jordan  "  is  still  to  them  their  master's 
rival,  a  man  to  be  jealous  of,  a  man  with  whom  John's 
death  even  does  not  bring  them  into  fellowship  ?  This 
too  we  find  not  easily  answered. 

There  are  these  difficulties,  then,  in  the  account 
which  the  Fourth  Gospel  gives.  We  do  not  wish  to 
be  too  positive,  and  we  will  grant  to  the  defenders  of 
the  book  that,  not  easily  indeed,  nor  without  violence, 
but  still  after  some  fashion  they  all  of  them  may  be 
accounted  for.  But  also  we  wish  to  point  out  how 
simply,  with  how  little  forcing,  they  may  be  explained 
upon  our  theory.  This  strange  baptism  of  the  Son  of 
God  by  a  sinful  man,  this  submission  to  the  power  of 
the  devil  in  the  wilderness,  what  could  be  more  natural 
than  to  drop  out  such  stories  as  really  not  to  be  explained, 
and  in  their  place  to  show  how  clearly  the  forerunner  had 
recognized  his  master?  First  to  the  Jews,  then  to  the 
disciples, — naturally  these  testimonies  would  fall  into  a 

6 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  83 

series  of  three,  a  favorite  number  with  the  Evangelist. 
A  dove,  so  tradition  said,  had  appeared  to  Jesus  ;  then 
the  Baptist  too  must  have  seen  it,  it  must  have  been  a 
sign  to  him,  a  sign  that  already  had  been  foretold,  a 
sign  which  he  could  not  have  kept  his  disciples  igno- 
rant of, — no  reasoning  could  be  simpler.  Jesus  must  ap- 
pear, too,  that  witness  may  be  borne  to  him,  a  shadowy 
form,  indeed,  moving  mysteriously  by  in  the  distance  ; 
what  doing  ?  whither  going  ?  what  need  to  ask  if  only 
he  give  the  Baptist  a  chance  to  speak  !  And  then  if 
the  Baptist  was  a  man  sent  from  God,  he  must  have 
recognized  Jesus  plainly,  he  must  have  recognized  him, 
not  as  the  Messiah  only,  but  as  the  pre-existent  Son  of 
God  ;  and  if  the  early  Gospels  did  not  tell  of  this,  then 
the  early  Gospels  could  not  have  been  complete. 

After  the  testimony  which  the  Baptist  gives,  there 
comes  an  account  of  the  call  of  several  of  John's  disciples, 
and  here  again  the  difference  from  the  old  account  is 
noticeable.  In  the  Synoptics,  though  here  too  there  are 
difiiculties  to  be  met,  Jesus  gradually  gathers  the  band 
of  Apostles  about  him,  for  not  all  at  once  does  he  meet 
with  the  men  whom  he  wants  ;  but  in  the  Fourth  Gos- 
pel they  are  ready  to  his  hand,  and  six  of  them  he  has 
at  the  end  of  the  second  day.  Which  one  of  these  ac- 
counts is  in  itself  more  likely  to  be  the  true  one,  the 
historical  one,  we  can  hardly  doubt ;  if  one  had  wished 
to  glorify  Jesus,  this  is  just  the  way  he  would  have 
gone  to  work.  To  glorify  Jesus, — that  is  what  every 
detail  seems  fitted  to  do.  Jesus  does  not  test  and  judge 
men  in  a  human  way,  but  at  a  glance  he  knows  what 
is  in  them.  Peter  is  a  rock,  Nathanael  is  an  Israelite 
without  guile,  and  even  definite  facts  in  Nathanael' s 
life  Jesus  knows  miraculously  ;  when  we  come  to  see 
what  this  knowledge  makes  necessary,  when  we  apply 


84         The  Life  a7id  Tcachi^igs  of  yesus. 

it,  as  the  Evangelist  does,  even  to  the  case  of  Judas, 
and  say  that  Jesus  had  chosen  Judas,  knowing  that  he 
would  prove  a  traitor,  then  we  see  how  absurd  and  im- 
possible it  becomes.  And  what  also  makes  it  hard  to 
accept  this  account  is  the  fact  that  already  the  older 
Evangelists  have  told  how  four  of  these  disciples  re- 
ceived a  call  from  Jesus  in  a  way  that  is  altogether  dif- 
ferent. Of  this  calling  in  Galilee,  by  the  Lake  of 
Genneseret,  John  does  not  speak,  and  it  is  difficult  to 
find  a  place  in  his  account  where  the  event  is  possible. 
Jesus,  in  the  Fourth  Gospel,  goes  to  Cana,  to  Caper- 
naum, to  Judaea,  where  for  seven  months  he  baptizes, 
to  Galilee  again,  and  all  this  time  his  disciples  are  with 
him,  as  a  fixed  part  of  his  household.  Who  are  these 
disciples  ?  naturally  of  course  they  are  the  disciples 
whom  John  alreadj'  has  mentioned.  If  now  the  other 
account  is  to  be  brought  into  the  narrative  of  John,  we 
must  suppose  that  when  Jesus  came  this  second  time 
into  Galilee,  after  the  disciples  had  been  with  him  for 
many  months,  he  disbanded  them  for  a  time,  to  collect 
them  together  again  in  the  manner  of  which  our  Syn- 
optic Gospels  have  given  an  account.  But  if  John 
gave  the  least  hint  of  this,  which  he  does  not,  if  such 
a  cessation  of  Jesus'  ministry  were  probable,  if  it  could 
be  explained  how  this  first  year  dropped  completely  out 
of  tradition,  still  the  fact  remains  that  the  old  account 
means  to  tell  of  a  first  call,  and  is  not  intelligible  if  we 
explain  it  in  any  other  way  ;  so  that  no  real  harmony 
between  the  two  can  be  admitted. 

For  the  moment  we  will  pass  by  the  miracle  at  Cana, 
which  has  nothing  in  the  Synoptics  to  correspond  with 
it,  and  will  come  to  the  cleansing  of  the  Temple.  And 
this  event  is  so  closely  connected  with  another  difference 
between  the  two  traditions,  the  most  striking  difference 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  85 

of  all,  that  we  shall  take  up  the  two  together.  If  we 
had  the  Synoptic  Gospels  alone,  we  undoubtedly  should 
suppose  that  Jesus'  ministry  lasted  at  the  most  a 
little  over  a  year,  and  that,  except  for  a  few  days  at 
Jerusalem  before  his  death,  it  was  confined  chiefly  to 
Galilee.  But  the  Fourth  Gospel  contradicts  this  de- 
cidedly ;  it  extends  Jesus'  public  life  to  several  years, 
and  it  gives  to  him  a  ministry,  an  extended  one,  in 
Judaea  and  in  Jerusalem,  as  well  as  in  Galilee.  Now 
it  would  be  very  unsafe  to  rest  much  in  the  matter  of 
chronology  upon  the  authority  of  the  early  Gospels,  for 
they  seem  to  have  had  no  chronological  data  worth 
speaking  of  to  go  on,  and  it  only  is  the  fact  that  they 
lump  all  the  narratives  together,  which  makes  it 
appear  that  these  were  included  in  a  single  year.  So 
far  as  the  mere  fact  goes,  then,  it  may  very  well  be  that 
John  is  nearer  to  the  truth  when  he  assigns  a  longer 
duration  to  Jesus'  public  life  ;  nor  is  it  impossible  that 
a  ministry  in  Judaea  should  have  been  lost  sight  of  by 
tradition.  But  when  we  consider  the  nature  of  the 
ministry  which  John  tells  of,  then  the  matter  begins  to 
take  on  a  difierent  complexion.  According  to  John, 
after  a  few  days  at  Capernaum  Jesus  goes  straight  to 
Jerusalem,  and  for  the  next  seven  months,  until 
December,  he  labors  in  Judaea.  Then  he  goes  back 
to  Galilee,  where,  if  John  is  right,  he  disbands  his  dis- 
ciples for  a  season  ;  but  very  soon  we  find  him  again 
in  Jerusalem,  in  all  probability  at  the  feast  of  Purim, 
in  March.  In  April  he  again  is  in  Galilee,  and  from 
this  time  we  lose  sight  of  him  till  October,  when  he 
comes  to  the  feast  of  Tabernacles  ;  and  in  December 
he  still  is  in  Jerusalem.  Till  the  next  April  again  he 
is  in  hiding,  when  he  appears  to  meet  his  fate.  Jesus, 
then,  passes  as  much  of  his  time  in  Judaea  as  he  passes 


86         The  Life  and  Teachings  of  fesus. 

in  Galilee,  and  indeed  he  passes  rather  more  of  his 
time  there.  If  we  had  the  Fourth  Gospel  alone,  we 
even  should  suppose  that  the  ministry-  in  Galilee  was 
an  afterthought,  that  Jesus  could  not  walk  in  Judaea 
because  the  Jews  sought  to  kill  him,  and  so  went  in 
to  the  northern  province,  that  the  Galileans  received 
him  because  they  saw  his  miracles  in  Jerusalem.  All 
this  time  Jesus  has  very  definite  and  bitter  relations 
with  the  authorities  in  Jerusalem,  and  these  relations 
affect  closely  the  future  of  his  life.  Could  tradition 
have  forgotten  all  this?  it  seems  rather  difiicult  to 
believe.  And  when  we  examine  it  a  little  more 
closely,  the  difiiculty  becomes  a  greater  one.  The 
most  of  the  events  which  the  older  Gospels  tell  us  of, 
conservative  critics  such  as  Weiss  have  had  to  assign 
ver}^  definitely  to  a  period  that  lies  between  two  points, 
between  the  opening  of  the  ministry  in  Galilee,  and  the 
feeding  of  the  multitudes,  if  the  history  is  to  be  at  all 
intelligible.  Here  take  place  the  rise,  the  progress, 
and  the  failure  of  the  Galilean  ministry,  which  the 
early  accounts  think  of  as  the  whole  of  Jesus'  work. 
But  if  we  are  to  fit  this  into  John's  chronology^,  we 
must  assign  it — the  great  mass,  let  us  remember,  of 
what  is  told  us  about  Jesus'  life, — to  a  period  which  is 
even  shorter  than  the  Synoptists  allow  for  it,  to  the 
few  months  between  the  arrival  in  Galilee,  in  Decem- 
ber, and  the  feeding  of  the  multitudes,  a  little  before 
the  Passover  in  April  ;  and  even  this  period  has  to  be 
shortened  hy  the  time  it  required  to  dismiss  the  dis- 
ciples and  call  them  together  again,  and  we  have  to 
break  into  it  by  another  journey  to  Jerusalem  at  the 
feast  of  Purim.  It  is  true  that  we  may  get  a  longer 
period  by  making  the  feast  of  John  5  :  i  some  other 
feast  than  Purim,  but  this  is  doing  violence  to  the 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  87 

natural  interpretation.  In  a  writer  whose  chronology 
we  can  follow  elsewhere  without  any  trouble,  and  who 
is  particularly  careful  to  mention  the  Passovers,  it  is 
unnatural  to  drop  out  a  Passover  feast  and  a  whole 
year  with  it  entirely  without  mention.  When  he 
mentions  a  Passover  in  the  second  chapter,  and  again 
another  in  the  sixth,  we  must  assume  that  the  one 
follows  on  the  other,  unless  there  are  strong  reasons 
against  supposing  this.  And  here  the  only  reason  is 
this  very  difficulty  which  we  are  urging  against  the 
Gospel.  But  the  rest  of  the  time,  how  are  we  to  fill 
that  up  ?  The  seven  months  of  the  ministry  in  Judaea, 
of  which  not  a  hint  has  come  down  to  us,  although  we 
certainly  should  expect  that  the  impression  which 
Jesus'  first  appearance  made  would  not  wholly  have 
been  lost ;  the  long  stretch  from  the  feeding  of  the 
thousands  to  the  feast  of  Tabernacles,  from  April  to 
December  ;  another  long  stretch  from  December  to 
April,  when  Jesus  actually  was  in  hiding, — how  are 
we  to  fill  these  clumsy  stretches  of  time  ?  And  still 
more  fatal  is  the  confusion  which  this  brings  into  Jesus' 
life-work.  There  is  no  clear-cut  plan,  but  a  strange 
vacillation,  a  leaving  of  one  work  to  go  to  another, 
with  success  in  neither  of  them,  a  six  months'  flight,  a 
four  months'  hiding.  But  how  easily  this  is  all  ex- 
plained when  we  stop  trying  to  harmonize  our  accounts. 
Jesus  must  testify  to  himself  in  the  capital,  he  must  be 
rejected  by  the  rulers,  it  was  at  the  feasts  that  he 
would  appear,  of  course,  to  testif)^  to  himself  he  must 
have  appeared  more  than  once ;  and  nothing  was 
easier  than  to  hit  upon  the  threefold  Passover  scheme, 
when  we  come  to  see  the  meaning  of  the  number  three. 
It  is  true  that  the  intervals  between  these  feasts  are 
very  hazy  and  indistinct ;  in  the  most  surprising  way 


88         The  Life  and  Teachings  of  fesus. 

we  find  that  no  sooner  is  one  feast  done  than  another 
is  at  hand,  with  only  an  "  after  these  things  "  to  show 
that  any  time  has  elapsed.  At  the  feast  of  Taber- 
nacles we  enter  upon  what  is  apparently  a  continuous 
narration,  and  all  at  once  we  find  ourselves  in  the  feast 
of  the  Dedication,  three  months  later.  In  March  Jesus 
heals  a  sick  man,  and  the  next  October  he  refers  to  it 
as  if  it  had  been  yesterday.  But  why  should  the 
Evangelist  trouble  himself  for  this  ?  He  has  brought 
Jesus  to  Jerusalem,  and  that  is  all  he  cares  to  do  ;  the 
trouble  he  was  to  bring  the  commentators  he  hardly 
could  have  guessed. 

And  now  to  come  back  to  the  point  where  we  began, 
the  cleansing  of  the  Temple,  which  John  puts  here, 
and  which  the  Synoptists  put  at  the  very  end,  has 
appealed  so  diiferently  to  different  persons,  according 
to  the  point  of  view  from  which  they  start  in,  that  it  is 
hardly  worth  while  putting  much  stress  upon  it.  To 
us  indeed  the  event  seems  more  natural  at  the  end  of 
Jesus'  ministry  than  at  its  beginning,  because  the 
Synoptic  Gospels  show  that  Jesus  did  not  enter  upon 
his  work  as  a  reformer,  but  that  he  tried  to  win  men 
by  gentleness  and  by  his  teaching  ;  and  they  imply 
also  that  the  opposition  to  him  began  in  a  very  differ- 
ent way.  However,  we  will  not  insist  upon  this,  if 
others  will  be  content  not  to  argue  from  it  to  John's 
originality. 

When  we  come  to  the  next  long  narrative  in  the 
Fourth  Gospel,  the  miraculous  feeding  and  the  walking 
on  the  sea,  we  find  that  John  agrees  closely  with  the 
older  accounts,  and  so  we  need  not  stop  here  very  long. 
Still  there  are  changes  to  be  noticed,  and  again  these 
changes  all  tend  to  glorify  Jesus.  Jesus  is  the  one  to 
propose  the  miracle,  he  suggests  it,  not  after  the  multi- 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  89 

tudes  in  listening  to  his  words  have  grown  weary  and 
hungr>',  but  as  soon  as  he  sees  them  coming  to  him,  he 
plays  good-humoredly  with  the  disciples'  unbelief.  To 
the  walking  on  the  sea,  also,  another  stupendous  mira- 
cle is  added,  and  the  boat  is  conveyed  suddenly  to  the 
land  ;  nor  do  we  think  that  the  sudden  appearance  of 
boats  enough  to  carry  five  thousand  persons  across  the 
lake  has  everything  in  its  favor.  But  the  difficulty  is 
more  serious  when,  a  little  farther  on,  we  come  to 
Peter's  confession.  In  the  older  account  this  is  at 
Csesarea  Philippi ;  here  it  seems  to  be  at  Capernaum. 
In  the  older  account  Peter  is  addressed  as  Satan  ;  here 
too  Jesus  calls  one  of  his  disciples  "  a  devil,"  but  it  is 
Judas  Iscariot,  and  not  Peter.  But  there  is  a  much 
more  important  change  in  the  whole  spirit  of  the  inci- 
dent. We  need  not  attempt  here  to  decide  whether 
Peter's  words  were  the  first  expression  of  the  disciple's 
belief  that  Jesus  was  the  Messiah,  but  this  much  the 
incident  certainly  was,  a  crisis  in  Jesus'  ministry,  when 
he  had  good  reason  to  be  doubtful  what  the  answer  to 
his  question  would  be.  But  in  John  there  is  no  trace 
of  this  crisis  ;  the  disciples  recognize  Jesus  fully  in  the 
beginning,  their  faith  is  increased  by  miracle  after 
miracle,  and  now  instead  of  a  solemn  avowal  from 
Peter  and  a  joyful  outburst  from  Jesus,  we  only  have, 
in  a  tone  of  grieved  surprise,  as  if  the  answer  were 
obvious  enough,  "Lord,  to  whom  shall  we  go?  thou 
hast  the  words  of  eternal  life."  Clearly,  from  the 
Evangelist's  standpoint,  the  disciples'  faith  never  could 
have  wavered,  but  with  this  standpoint  the  verdict  of 
history  cannot  agree. 

It  is  at  the  close  of  the  history,  in  the  account  of  the 
Passion,  that  John's  connection  with  the  Synoptics  is 
most  extended,  and  this  we  shall  now  have  to  look  at. 


90        The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

In  their  general  outline  the  two  agree  very  well,  but 
still  the  differences  are  sufficiently  marked.  First  there 
comes  the  famous  difficulty  about  the  day  on  which 
Jesus  was  crucified  ;  was  it  the  first  day  of  the  feast, 
as  the  Sj'noptics  imply,  or  the  day  before,  the  14th  of 
Nisan,  as  John  tells  us?  We  do  not  care  to  venture 
into  the  vast  wilderness  of  learning  which  has  grown 
up  about  this  discussion,  since  we  probably  should  not 
convince  any  one  who  does  not  care  to  be  convinced. 
We  are  ready  to  admit  that  there  are  difficulties  on 
both  sides.  That  the  arrest  and  trial  of  Jesus  should 
have  taken  place  upon  a  feast  day  is  not  what  we 
should  have  expected,  but  at  the  same  time  the  fact 
that  Jesus  ate  the  Passover  on  the  night  of  his  betrayal 
is  hardly  to  be  denied,  and  it  is  not  possible  to  show 
that  the  Passover  could  be  eaten  at  any  other  than  the 
appointed  time.  But  again  we  have  to  notice  the  sus- 
picious readiness  with  which  John's  account  can  be 
explained.  Naturally  enough  Christian  teachers  came 
early  to  see  a  type  of  Christ  in  the  Paschal  lamb,  and 
to  speak  of  "  Christ  our  Passover  who  suffered  for  us  "  ; 
for  all  the  circumstances  of  his  death  went  to  make  this 
almost  inevitable.  Now  the  Fourth  Evangelist  most 
of  all  would  be  inclined  to  a  view  which  gave  a  spirit- 
ual tm^n  to  the  old  ritual,  and  at  the  same  time  did 
away  with  it  as  something  literally  to  be  observed  ; 
and  with  this  thought  once  in  his  mind,  it  would  not 
be  hard  for  him  to  conclude  that  Jesus'  death  must 
have  conformed  much  more  exactly  to  the  older  type 
than  the  Synoptists  made  it  out  to  do,  that  Jesus  must 
really  have  been  slain  when  the  Paschal  lamb  was 
slain.  And  there  are  several  indications  which,  possi- 
bly at  least,  point  to  this  very  thing.  The  Baptist,  it 
will  be  remembered,  points  out  Jesus  expressly  as  the 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  91 

Lamb  of  God.  In  a  speech  of  Jesus'  own,  too,  there 
is  a  metaphor  which,  carried  out  perhaps  somewhat 
too  crudely,  indicates  the  same  thing,  the  metaphor  of 
Jesus'  flesh  and  blood.  Then  the  anointing  of  Jesus  is 
placed  by  John,  in  opposition  to  the  other  Gospels,  six 
days  before  the  Passover,  on  the  da)^  when  the  Paschal 
lamb  was  selected.  The  account  of  the  Passover  meal  is 
ignored  by  John,  and  the  explanations  that  have  been 
given  for  this,  if  they  are  possible  explanations,  are 
still  not  quite  satisfactory  ;  but  if  Jesus  was  the  Pass- 
over lamb  himself,  of  course  he  could  not  have  eaten 
the  Passover,  and  the  omission  is  explained  at  once. 
Then  John  places  the  sentence  of  Jesus  at  noon,  which 
does  not  agree  with  the  older  Gospels,  but  which  does 
agree  with  the  time  when  preparations  were  begun  for 
killing  the  Passover  lamb.  Last  of  all  he  brings  in  an 
incident  which  is  quite  unknown  to  the  older  Gospels, 
and  by  which  he  shows  that  the  command  which  was 
given  in  regard  to  the  Paschal  lamb,  that  a  bone  of  it 
should  not  be  broken,  was  fulfilled  in  the  case  of  Jesus. 
Differences  so  decided  as  this  will  not  be  found  in  the 
rest  of  the  account,  but  still  the  differences  are  numer- 
ous, and  they  are  not  the  most  of  them  easily  to  be 
justified.  There  are,  for  example,  the  plots  of  the 
Pharisees  against  Jesus,  which  John  places  back  at 
the  very  commencement  of  Jesus'  ministry.  Again 
and  again  the  Jews  try  to  take  him  and  put  him  to 
death,  and  they  even  send  ofiicers  to  seize  him  ;  but 
the  officers  are  overawed  by  Jesus'  words,  and  return 
without  their  prisoner,  and  the  Jews  do  not  dare  to  re- 
sent the  disobedience  of  their  subordinates  except  by 
a  harmless  sneer.  And  yet  along  with  this  helpless- 
ness, the  Pharisees  find  no  trouble  in  directing  the 
ban  of  the  synagogue  against  all  who  confess  Jesus, 


92         The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

the  people  hardly  venture  to  speak  above  their  breath 
for  fear  of  the  Jews,  Jesus  himself  is  forced  into  hid- 
ing, and  public  orders  are  given  that  any  one  who 
knows  his  whereabouts  shall  make  it  known  ;  and  it 
is  just  after  the  most  alarming  demonstration  in  Jesus' 
favor  that  his  enemies  cast  aside  their  fears  and  venture 
to  seize  him.  To  us  it  is  not  easy  to  think  of  circum- 
stances which  make  proceedings  such  as  these  quite 
probable,  and  all  the  more  as  a  desire  to  show  the 
majesty  of  Jesus  and  the  power  of  his  words,  to  repre- 
sent the  fruitless  struggles  of  the  powers  of  the  world 
against  the  decrees  of  God,  which  only  could  be  carried 
out  when  the  time  was  come,  would  concern  itself  but 
little  with  the  probabilities  of  history.  And  the  way  in 
w^hich  at  last  the  catastrophe  is  brought  about,  this  too 
is  significant.  So  long  as  Jesus  wishes  to  protect  him- 
self from  his  enemies  he  has  no  trouble  in  doing  this  ; 
but  he  is  only  waiting  till  the  time  is  fulfilled,  till  he 
can  sujffer  as  God  has  appointed  him,  as  a  Passover,  a 
sacrifice  for  the  nation.  And  when  this  time  comes,  he 
goes  of  his  own  accord  to  meet  his  fate,  he  insists  that 
his  death  is  purely  voluntary,  he  goes  to  the  place 
where  he  was  wont  to  resort  with  his  disciples  that  he 
may  not  seem  to  be  trjdng  to  escape,  he  knows  the  trai- 
tor from  the  beginning.  Again  do  we  not  see  how  the 
old  account  would  give  offence,  how  Jesus  must  be  the 
decider  of  his  own  destiny  ?  and  yet  we  cannot  hold 
this  view  unless  we  make  Jesus'  death  nothing  less 
than  suicide. 

We  do  not  care  to  dwell  in  detail  upon  the  rest  of  the 
story,  however  instructive  such  a  comparison  might  be. 
John  for  example  does  not  tell  of  the  trial  before  the 
Sanhedrin  ;  Jesus  is  taken  to  Annas  and  then  to  Caia- 
phas,  and  from  Caiaphas  he  is  l^d  before  Pilate,  and 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  93 

whether  there  is  room  here  for  a  trial  we  feel  inclined 
to  doubt.  Indeed  John,  if  we  read  him  naturally, 
would  seem  to  say  that  the  trial  before  Pilate  was  the 
only  one.  Then  the  strange  incident  of  a  voice  from 
heaven,  the  strange  power  of  Jesus  in  the  garden, 
where  his  captors  fall  before  him  to  the  ground, — how 
hard  these  are  to  think  of  as  real  events.  And  again 
the  curious  shifting  of  the  scene  in  Jesus'  trial,  the 
negotiations  with  the  rulers  and  not  with  the  people 
concerning  the  release  of  a  prisoner,  the  omission  of 
the  agony  in  Gethsemane,  with  only  a  sentence  to  show 
that  even  for  a  moment  Jesus'  "  soul  was  troubled," 
the  greater  minuteness  of  the  fulfilment  of  prophecy 
in  the  division  of  Jesus'  raiment,  the  flowing  of  blood 
and  water  from  Jesus'  side,  so  doubtful  in  itself  and  so 
clearly  meant  to  have  a  deeper  meaning,  the  enormous 
amount  of  the  embalming  spices, — all  these  and  other 
things  cannot  in  fairness  be  overlooked.  All  of  them 
perhaps  may  be  explained  away,  and  if  any  one  is  satis- 
fied to  explain  them  away  we  have  no  quarrel  with  him. 
We  only  ask  that  men  should  see  that  there  is  a  prob- 
lem to  be  accounted  for,  and  that  one  even  may  find  it 
not  to  be  accounted  for  at  all  in  the  old  way,  and  still 
not  wilfully  be  creating  difficulties  for  himself  where 
difficulties  do  not  exist. 

Finally  we  come  to  the  last  two  chapters  of  the  book, 
to  the  events  which  followed  Jesus'  resurrection  ;  and 
here  too,  if  we  will  not  shut  our  eyes  to  them,  the 
difficulties  are  very  plain.  Upon  the  great  difficulty 
which  we  have  when  we  try  to  conceive  of  such  a  resur- 
rection as  John's  account  implies,  we  will  not  now 
insist,  although  that  must  be  allowed  its  proper 
weight.  Nor  will  we  compare  the  Fourth  Gospel  with 
the  older  stories,  though  here,  too,  there  are  things 


94         The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

which  need  to  be  explained.  So,  for  one  thing,  the 
appearance  of  the  angels  to  Mary,  which  lacks  all 
motive  here,  we  cannot  well  help  thinking  was  taken 
from  the  older  Gospels,  where  the  angels  have  a  real 
announcement  to  make.  On  this,  however,  we  do  not 
insist,  but  what  we  do  wish  to  insist  upon  is  the  rela- 
tion which  our  story  bears  to  Paul's  account.  To 
Paul  the  resurrection  stood  as  the  centre  of  his  faith, 
and  he  had  made  careful  inquiries  about  it  when  the 
facts  still  were  fresh.  Accordingly,  he  is  able  to  give 
the  number  of  appearances  and  their  order,  and  in  his 
letter  to  the  Corinthians  this  is  what  he  does.  Now 
Paul  is  our  only  witness  to  the  resurrection  who  is 
unassailable,  and  Paul,  in  a  passage  where  evidently 
he  is  trying  to  be  as  exact  as  he  knows  how,  can  tell 
only  of  five  appearances — to  Peter,  to  the  twelve,  to 
five  hundred  brethren,  to  James,  and  to  the  twelve 
again.  But  we  cannot  make  this  list  agree  with  the 
list  which  the  Fourth  Gospel  gives.  First,  there  comes 
an  appearance  to  Mary,  and  this  Paul  does  not  men- 
tion ;  however,  Paul's  opinion  of  women,  as  we  know, 
was  not  very  high,  and  perhaps  he  thought  that  to 
bring  in  Mary  as  a  witness  would  only  be  to  hurt  his 
case.  Then  the  appearance  to  Peter,  John,  it  may  be, 
does  not  exclude,  and  yet  one  gets  a  strong  impression 
from  the  account,  that  the  appearance  in  the  evening 
was  the  first  time  that  Jesus  had  shown  himself  to  any 
of  his  disciples.  This  latter  appearance  we  must  iden- 
tify with  the  one  which  Paul  speaks  of,  though  Paul, 
it  is  to  be  noticed,  thinks  that  all  the  disciples  were 
present  and  does  not  know  of  Thomas's  absence.  Still, 
so  far  the  difficulties,  while  they  are  real  difficulties, 
are  perhaps  not  inexplicable,  but  the  other  differences 
we  do  not  think  can  be  explained  in  any  natural  way. 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  95 

Of  the  appearance  in  Jerusalem  a  week  later  Paul 
knows  nothing,  for  we  cannot  think  that  it  is  the  sec- 
ond appearance  to  the  twelve  which  Paul  speaks  of, 
because  with  Paul  this  comes  last,  while  with  John 
other  appearances  follow.  Besides,  the  week  which 
John  speaks  of  does  not  give  time  for  the  appearance 
to  the  five  hundred,  which  only  could  have  taken  place 
in  Galilee.  Finally,  the  scene  by  the  lakeside,  a  story 
which,  it  is  significant,  Luke  also  has  in  another  con- 
nection, has  no  point  of  contact  at  all  with  Paul's  list. 
So  that  of  the  four  appearances  which  John  gives, 
there  are  three  which  Paul  is  ignorant  of  altogether, 
and  in  the  case  of  the  other  one  the  agreement  is  not 
exact.  How  are  we  to  reconcile  the  two  accounts  ? 
Must  it  not  be  admitted  that  they  are  not  to  be  recon- 
ciled ? 

There  are  still  three  incidents  which  have  not  been 
spoken  of  as  yet,  because  it  only  is  in  the  Fourth  Gos- 
pel that  they  are  found,  and  so  they  cannot  be  com- 
pared with  accounts  which  have  come  to  us  from  other 
sources.  But  these  incidents  are  so  important  that  they 
cannot  be  passed  by  in  silence,  and  to  these  it  will  now 
be  necessary  to  go  back.  The  first  of  these  is  the 
miracle  of  the  wine,  which  is  found  in  the  second  chapter 
of  the  Gospel.  With  the  question  whether  a  miracle  is 
possible  we  are  not  now  concerned  ;  but  that  in  this 
particular  miracle  the  difficulties  which  one  has  to 
meet  are  peculiarly  great,  most  critics  latterly  have 
been  willing  to  admit.  To  supply  a  lack  of  wine 
Jesus'  mother  hints  to  him,  so  it  seems  almost  neces- 
sary to  understand,  that  he  should  work  a  miracle, 
although  Jesus  up  to  this  time  never  had  shown  any 
ability  to  work  miracles,  least  of  all  a  miracle  like  this. 
Jesus  sharply  rebukes  his  mother,  and  thereupon  goes 


96         The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

on  at  once  to  follow  out  her  suggestion, — then  there 
are  minor  difficulties.  Tradition,  too,  knows  nothing 
of  the  miracle,  and  this,  when  we  consider  how  great 
a  one  it  was,  will  also  seem  to  be  a  little  strange.  But 
what  after  all  is  the  real  objection  is  the  fact  that  we 
can  find  no  motive  for  the  deed  which  seems  at  all 
strong  enough  to  account  for  it.  There  was  no  real 
necessity  for  wine  ;  the  guests  already  had  well  drunk, 
and  to  supply  more  would  only  be  to  lead  to  excess. 
The  quantity  of  the  wine  which  Jesus  makes  is,  one 
cannot  refuse  to  admit,  enormous,  and  wine  moreover 
was  not  something  there  was  any  need  should  be 
created,  but  it  was  to  be  obtained  in  a  natural  way. 
So  that  there  is  nothing  left  for  it  but  to  say,  as  the 
Evangelist  says,  that  this  miracle  Jesus  performed  only 
to  manifest  forth  his  glory.  Now  a  miracle  of  ostenta- 
tion is  most  of  all  a  difficult  miracle  to  hold  to.  So 
long  as  Jesus'  works  are  works  of  love,  of  mercy, 
meant  to  help  the  needs  of  men,  as  in  the  older  Gospels 
they  for  the  most  part  are,  then  at  the  least  we  see  a 
reason  why  they  should  be  performed  ;  but  when  we 
take  away  this  motive,  and  leave  only  the  wonder  part 
behind,  the  magic,  one  cannot  well  complain  if  men 
find  this  less  easy  to  accept.  And  here  again  we  can- 
not refuse  to  see  how  simply  all  our  trouble  is  got  rid 
of,  if  only  our  theory  of  the  Gospel  is  true.  "To 
manifest  forth  his  glory" — that  throughout  our  Evan- 
gelist has  it  in  his  mind  to  do  ;  and  with  this  in  his 
mind  is  not  our  miracle  just  the  sort  of  miracle  he 
would  have  been  likely  to  hit  upon  ?  Already  he  has 
one  miracle  before  him,  the  miracle  of  the  bread,  and 
this  he  refers  expressly  to  the  breaking  of  Christ's 
body,  to  the  Eucharist.  Evidently  then  there  must  be 
another  miracle  to  make  this  complete,  the  miracle  of 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  97 

the  wine,  the  blood.  A  correspondence  like  this  in  a 
real  event  it  is  not  likely  ever  would  occur  ;  but  as  an 
idea,  a  result  of  reflection,  it  is  quite  intelligible,  and 
in  no  other  way,  we  are  inclined  to  think,  is  it  intelli- 
gible at  all. 

In  the  ninth  chapter  there  is  another  story  which 
is  not  present  in  the  Synoptics,  the  healing  of  the  man 
bom  blind.  We  say  that  it  is  not  present  in  the 
Synoptics,  though  after  all  the  use  of  material  means 
to  effect  the  cure  suggests  that  it  may  be  based  upon 
the  similar  story  in  the  eighth  chapter  of  Mark.  In 
itself,  however,  this  story  is  not  so  suspicious  as  the 
miracle  of  the  wine,  although  there  are  indeed  features 
of  it  which  are  suspicious.  Again  the  miracle  is  to 
glorify  Jesus  ;  Jesus  does  not  heal  the  man  through 
pity,  and  he  even  tells  his  disciples  that  the  man  was 
born  blind  simply  that  he  might  have  an  opportunity 
to  work  the  miracle.  Then  too  the  means  which  he 
uses  to  effect  the  cure  are  very  strange, — magical, 
we  should  almost  be  inclined  to  call  them.  Still  to 
the  account  as  a  whole  we  have  no  very  great  objection, 
and  one  might  even  find  in  it  strong  indications  of  its 
truth.  Certainly  it  is  all  very  vivid  and  life-like.  The 
coolness  and  keen,  sarcastic  common-sense  of  the  blind 
man,  the  discomfiture  of  the  Pharisees,  the  ludicrous 
eagerness  of  the  parents  to  keep  themselves  out  of  any 
entanglement,  the  dramatic  movement  of  the  whole,  is 
admirable  indeed  ;  and  to  many  no  doubt  this  vividness 
of  the  Gospel  seems  to  be  a  strong  argument  in  its 
favor.  To  us  however  it  has  always  seemed  that  this 
argument  is  a  very  dangerous  one,  and  that  rather  it 
points  quite  decidedly  the  other  way.  For  we  have 
been  obliged  to  ask  how  it  is  that  John  has  been  able 
for  so  many  years  to  keep  in  his  mind  just  the  details 


98         The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

fitted  to  form  a  perfect  and  finished  picture  ;  how,  more 
important  still,  did  he  get  them  at  the  start?  We 
have  been  constantly  surprised  to  find  how  accurately 
our  Evangelist  is  informed  of  events  where  he  could 
not,  it  would  seem,  possibly  have  been  present  himself. 
So,  here,  John  knows  the  conversation  of  the  neigh- 
bors, he  knows  what  was  said  at  several  interviews 
with  the  Pharisees,  and  what  passed  between  the  Phar- 
isees themselves.  And  if  we  go  through  the  book  we 
find  constantly  the  same  difficulty  ;  the  conversation 
between  the  Baptist  and  his  disciples  at  ^non,  the 
talk  with  the  woman  of  Samaria,  where  Jesus  was 
alone,  the  talk  among  the  Samaritans  themselves,  the 
conversation  between  the  Jews  and  the  impotent  man, 
the  murmuring  of  the  Jews  once  and  again  about  Jesus, 
the  secret  plottings  of  the  rulers  in  council.  He  knows 
too  the  elaborate  conversation  between  Jesus  and  Pilate  ; 
did  John  follow  back  and  forth  at  Pilate's  heels,  or  did 
he  find  some  soldier  of  the  guard  who  had  enough 
spiritual  insight  to  report  the  words  ?  If  only  once 
or  twice  we  had  to  account  for  this,  we  should  not 
lay  stress  upon  it,  but  should  say  that  in  some  un- 
known way,  which  now  we  only  can  guess,  the  in- 
formation may  have  come  to  John  ;  and  even  now,  if 
one  will  have  it  so,  the  same  thing  may  be  true,  for 
there  is  nothing  of  which  we  cannot  conceive  a  pos- 
sible way  in  which  it  might  have  become  known.  But 
still  when  everything  is  put  together  we  cannot  think 
that  it  is  natural  to  suppose  this,  least  of  all  when  we 
notice  how  dramatically  the  whole  is  pictured,  how 
artistically  all  things  work  together  to  give  an  over- 
whelming impression  of  Jesus'  majesty  and  power,  can 
we  help  suspecting  that  we  have  to  do  with  an  author 
who  is  not  bound  down  and  hampered  by  a  partial  ig- 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  99 

norance,  but  who  can  make  his  picture  dramatic  and 
effective  because  his  picture  is  ideal. 

lyast  of  all  there  is  the  story  which  is  the  most  re- 
markable, perhaps,  of  all  the  stories  in  the  Fourth 
Gospel,  the  account  of  the  raising  of  the  dead  I^azarus. 
Here  again  we  will  not  deny  that  the  miracle  is  pos- 
sible, but,  admitting  that  it  is  possible,  we  only 
will  ask  whether  it  is  likely  to  have  happened, 
whether  the  proof  for  it  is  clear  and  unassailable.  And 
to  begin  with,  no  one  we  think  can  help  seeing  that 
the  spirit  of  the  miracle,  while  it  is  very  easy  to  under- 
stand from  the  standpoint  of  the  Evangelist,  is  from 
Jesus'  standpoint  very  strange  indeed.  That  Jesus 
should  let  his  friend  die  in  order  that  he  might  raise 
him  up  again,  that  he  should  rejoice  at  the  opportunity 
to  work  a  great  miracle,  that  before  the  grave  he  should 
call  attention  to  his  glory  in  a  prayer  which  was  ad- 
dressed to  the  people  and  not  to  God,  is  to  the  Evan- 
gelist quite  natural,  but  to  us  we  confess  it  is  not 
conceivable  at  all.  It  is  Jesus'  compassion,  as  we  have 
said  before,  his  desire  to  relieve  distress,  which  most  of 
all  gives  to  his  miracles  a  convincing  power.  That 
now  he  should  reverse  all  this,  that  he  should  create 
the  distress  in  order  to  relieve  it,  that  he  should  glorify 
himself  at  the  expense  of  Lazarus  and  his  sisters,  this 
is  what  we  cannot  bring  ourselves  to  believe.  And 
there  is  another  objection  to  the  miracle  which  in  itself 
is  almost  conclusive,  the  fact  that  no  trace  of  it  appears 
in  the  older  Gospels.  For  among  the  cures  of  which 
the  Gospels  give  a  great  abundance  this  is  by  all  means 
the  one  which  is  the  most  striking.  To  raise  a  man 
who  has  been  four  days  in  the  grave,  this  every  one 
must  feel  is  more  striking,  appeals  more  to  the  imagina- 
tion, than  to  restore  a  girl  who  has  died  scarcel}'  an 


lOO       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  yesus. 

hour  before.  And  not  only  is  this  the  most  striking  of 
Jesus'  cures,  but  it  is  a  cure  which  took  place  at  the 
crisis  of  Jesus'  life,  and  which  had  much  to  do  in  bring- 
ing that  crisis  about.  That  tradition,  with  all  its  love 
of  the  marvellous,  should  have  lost  sight  of  an  event 
like  this  comes  little  short  of  being  inconceivable,  and 
before  admitting  it  we  must  have  evidence  for  the 
reality  of  the  event  which  is  very  strong  indeed. 

And  now  with  these  objections  before  us,  if  we  find 
that  there  is  a  way  which  will  explain  how  the  story 
came  to  be  thought  of,  and  that  there  is  a  curious 
coincidence  which  only  can  be  accounted  for  in  this  way, 
then  for  our  part  we  cannot  any  longer  be  in  doubt. 
It  happens  that  there  is  such  a  way,  and  that  we  still 
are  able  to  point  it  out.  The  name  Lazarus  is  not  a 
common  name  in  the  New  Testament,  and  indeed  there 
is  only  one  other  place  where  it  occurs,  in  a  parable 
found  in  the  third  Gospel ;  and  the  parable  of  the  rich 
man  and  Lazarus  closes  with  this  sentence,  "  Neither 
will  they  be  persuaded  though  one  rose  from  the  dead." 
And  this  is  just  what  John's  story  means  to  show,  that 
not  even  when  Lazarus  is  raised  from  the  dead  will  the 
Pharisees  believe  ;  their  hatred  only  is  intensified,  and 
at  once  they  plot  Jesus'  death.  That  the  name  should 
occur  but  once,  and  then  should  be  found  in  a  passage 
which  lends  itself  so  readily  to  an  explanation  like  this, 
is  surely  a  curious  fact ;  we  are  not  able  to  think  that 
it  is  a  coincidence  and  nothing  more. 

We  have  now  gone  through  the  Gospel,  and  with 
some  detail  have  shown  why  we  find  it  hard  to  believe 
that  the  Gospel  was  written  by  an  Apostle.  We  have 
not  tried  to  hunt  up  objections,  but  have  taken  only 
those  which  are  on  the  surface  ;  and  because  there  are 
so  many  of  them,  because  they  all  of  them  point  so 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  loi 

clearly  in  this  one  direction,  we  are  not  satisfied  with 
the  attempts  which  have  been  made  to  explain  them 
away,  although  for  each  one  of  them  an  explanation 
doubtless  can  be  found.  But  it  is  not  an  explanation 
simply  that  we  are  looking  for,  we  want  a  probable 
explanation  ;  and  this,  although  we  willingly  would 
have  done  so,  we  have  not  been  able  to  discover.  And 
there  is  still  one  thing  more,  the  discourses  of  the  Gos- 
pel, which  of  all  things  is  perhaps  the  hardest  to  ex- 
plain. Against  the  speeches  of  the  Fourth  Gospel 
there  are  upon  the  face  of  them  very  obvious  objections 
to  be  brought.  They  are  all  long  speeches,  some  very 
long  indeed,  so  that  for  any  one  to  have  reproduced 
them  immediately  after  they  were  spoken,  would  have 
been  a  difficult  thing  to  do,  to  say  nothing  of  repro- 
ducing them  after  half  a  century  had  passed.  Then,  be- 
sides, the  character  of  the  speeches  differs  very  greatly 
from  the  sayings  of  Jesus  which  the  Synoptic  Gospels 
give,  so  that  one  would  be  inclined  to  say  that  they 
cannot  possibly  have  come  from  the  same  man  ;  and  so 
far  as  the  style  goes  this  undoubtedly  is  true,  as  all 
critics  we  suppose  are  now  ready  to  admit.  But  that 
the  style  belongs  to  the  Evangelist  and  not  to  Jesus 
does  not  of  necessity  count  for  much,  for  the  ground- 
work of  the  speeches  still  might  be  genuine,  even  if 
John  had  been  obliged  to  give  his  recollections  largely 
in  his  own  words.  But  the  matter  of  the  speeches  also 
is  new,  and  this  is  not  so  easily  set  aside.  The  sayings 
of  the  Fourth  Gospel  have  a  strangely  different  ring  to 
them  :  ' '  Except  a  man  be  born  of  water  and  of  spirit, 
he  cannot  enter  the  kingdom  of  God  "  ;  "  No  one  hath 
ascended  into  heaven,  except  he  who  came  down  out 
of  heaven,  even  the  Son  of  Man"  ;  "That  all  may 
honor  the  Son  even  as  they  honor  the  Father.     He 


I02        The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 


that  honoretli  not  the  Son  honoreth  not  the  Father  who 
sent  him  "  ;  "  When  je  shall  see  the  Son  of  Man  go- 
ing up  where  he  was  before  "  ;  "I  and  the  Father  are 
one "  ;  "  Before  Abraham  was,  I  am  "  ;  "  All  that 
came  before  me  are  thieves  and  robbers "  ;  "I  came 
forth  from  the  Father,  and  am  come  into  the  world  ; 
again  I  leave  the  world  and  go  to  the  Father. ' '  In  the 
Synoptic  Gospels  there  is  nothing  to  compare  with  this, 
or  at  the  very  most  there  are  only  two  or  three  faint 
traces  of  it ;  there  Jesus  speaks  of  righteousness,  of 
the  kingdom  of  heaven.  But  here  this  is  the  way  in 
which  Jesus  always  talks,  and  we  expect  nothing  else 
of  him.  Now  if  Jesus  uttered  sa5'ings  like  these  in  so 
great  an  abundance,  we  do  not  see  how  tradition  came 
to  miss  them,  for  we  should  suppose  they  were  just  the 
sayings  to  be  seized  upon  first.  But  whether  Jesus 
ever  could  have  spoken  like  this  seems  fairly  to  be 
doubtful.  Discussions  with  the  Jews  about  his  di- 
vinity, constant  claims  of  a  pre-existence,  of  a  descent 
from  heaven,  of  a  superhuman  knowledge,  these  appear 
to  us  far  more  natural  in  the  mouth  of  a  late  disciple 
than  in  the  mouth  of  Jesus  himself.  Sometimes  this 
becomes  evident  even  to  the  commentators,  and  they 
.suppose — one  case  is  in  the  talk  with  Nicodemus — that 
John  suddenly  passes  from  Jesus'  words  to  his  own 
reflections  ;  but  there  is  no  ground  whatever  for  sup- 
posing this,  and  the  narrative  goes  along  without  a 
break.  And  the  claims  which  Jesus  makes  for  him- 
self— I  am  the  light  of  the  world,  I  am  the  bread  of 
life,  I  am  the  water  of  life,  I  am  the  vine,  I  am  the 
good  .shepherd,  I  am  the  door,  I  am  the  way,  the  truth, 
and  the  life,  I  am  the  resurrection  and  the  life, — it 
surely  is  strange  that  all  these  claims,  .so  like  to  one 
another,  should  have  been  made  by  Jesus  in  the  com- 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  103 

paratively  few  speeches  which  John  has  given  ;  they 
look  much  more  like  the  results  of  reflection  upon 
Jesus'  person.  Nor  is  it  easy  to  reconcile  these  say- 
ings with  the  fact  which  we  learn  from  the  other  Gos- 
pels, that  it  was  at  any  rate  only  towards  the  close  of 
his  work* that  Jesus  claimed  definitely  to  be  the  Mes- 
siah. Now  John  himself  recognizes  this,  at  least  in 
words,  for  he  makes  the  Pharisees  ask  Jesus  why  he 
keeps  them  in  doubt,  why  he  does  not  tell  them  plainly. 
But  then  too  Jesus  replies  to  them  that  he  already  has 
told  them  from  the  beginning  ;  and  truly  if  the  Phari- 
sees could  have  been  in  any  doubt  after  all  that  Jesus 
had  said  and  done,  they  must  have  been  indeed  dull  of 
understanding.  And  another  thing  which  impresses  us 
strongly  in  these  speeches  of  Jesus  in  the  Fourth  Gos- 
pel is  the  lack  of  sympathy  the\'  show,  the  absence  of  the 
tenderness  and  love  of  Jesus.  Jesus  takes  no  pains  to 
win  men,  to  conciliate  them  ;  his  words  are  cold  and 
judicial.  There  is  no  divine  sorrow  over  the  blindness 
of  his  people  ;  "  Unless  ye  believe  that  I  am  he,  ye 
shall  die  in  your  sins."  Jesus  assumes  from  the  begin- 
ning that  they  will  not  listen  to  him,  and  his  words  are 
only  to  assert  himself,  to  make  them  without  excuse. 
Even  when  men  are  beginning  to  believe  on  him,  Jesus 
does  not  try  to  strengthen  the  weakness  of  their  faith, 
but  only  has  a  cold  word  of  exhortation  for  them ; 
and  when  they  fail  to  understand  this  he  sharply  repels 
them  as  children  of  the  devil.  These  things  are  on 
the  surface ;  and  when  we  come  to  examine  the 
speeches  a  little  more  carefully,  we  find  that  there 
are  other  things  besides.  We  have  had  to  notice 
already  how  artistically  the  book  is  made  up,  how  the 
details  are  subordinated  to  a  definite  end  ;  and  this  is 
even  more  noticeable  in  the  speeches  perhaps  than  it  is 


I04      The  Life  and  Teacliings  of  Jesus. 

in  the  narratives.  The  variet)^  in  these  speeches  is 
very  small  indeed  ;  from  beginning  to  end  it  is  to  the 
same  thing  that  all  point.  There  are  a  few  favorite 
thoughts  and  phrases  which  are  repeated  again  and 
again,  and  which  are  dwelt  upon  in  every  aspect ;  one 
speech  indeed,  is  made  up  entirely  of  sentences  which 
already  have  been  given,  and  seems  to  be  meant  as 
a  sort  of  summary  of  what  has  gone  before.'  The 
speeches  are  bound  closely  together,  often  by  cross 
references.  Jesus  refers  to  a  miracle  performed  seven 
months  before,  to  the  disciples  he  speaks  of  a  saying 
which  six  months  before  he  had  spoken  to  the  Jews, 
the  Jews  attempt  to  entangle  Jesus  in  argument  by 
bringing  up  an  admission  which  he  had  made  seven 
months  previousl}^  The  speeches,  too,  are  closely 
interwoven  with  the  events,  they  take  the  events  as  a 
text,  and  turn  them  into  figure  and  symbol.  Espe- 
cially does  one  have  to  suspect  the  conversations  w^hich 
so  often  occur,  and  the  questions  which  are  put  to 
Jesus  ;  it  would  be  so  easy  for  an  author  to  think  of 
remarks  which  should  help  along  the  progress  of  the 
speech  and  save  it  from  monotony,  and  in  themselves 
the  remarks  do  not  tell  very  strongly  in  favor  of  their 
genuineness.  A  conversation  with  a  crowd  of  men  in 
the  manner  in  which  the  Gospel  often  represents  it  is  not 
quite  easy  to  imagine,  and  least  of  all  is  it  easy  when 
Jesus  has  a  miraculous  knowledge  of  what  his  hearers 
are  talking  about  among  themselves.  For,  to  say 
nothing  of  the  difficulty  about  the  miracle,  it  gives  one 
the  impression  that  Jesus  had  constantly  to  wait  for  his 
hearers  to  talk  his  words  over,  and  then  that  he  took 
up  his  discourse  again  to  answer  them.     And  the  ques- 

'  John  12  :  44  if: 


The  Fou7^th  Gospel.  105 

tions  themselves  are  not  probable.  The  misunder- 
standings are  too  constant  and  too  gross,  and  often  the 
questions  are  so  vague  that  they  hardly  have  any 
meaning  ;  too  plainly  they  only  give  a  catch-word 
which  Jesus  can  develop.  Let  us  take  a  single  dis- 
course and  examine  it  more  carefully,  and  that  we 
may  not  be  unfair,  we  will  take  one  where  the  argu- 
ments which  can  be  brought  forward  for  its  genuineness 
are  unusually  strong.  The  conversation  with  the 
woman  of  Samaria  is  very  dramatic  and  spirited,  it 
contains  several  sentences  which  show  deep  spiritual 
insight,  and  it  betrays  a  considerable  acquaintance  with 
the  scenery  of  the  spot,  and  with  Jewish  and  Samar- 
itan custoins.  But  just  because  it  is  so  spiritual  is  it 
suspicious,  easy  to  understand  as  an  ideal  picture,  a 
foil  to  the  unbelief  of  the  Jews,  but  not  so  easy  to 
understand  as  a  real  scene.  The  story  in  the  first 
place  does  not  agree  with  the  facts  of  history.  A 
successful  ministry  in  Samaria  during  Jesus'  lifetime 
there  are  strong  reasons  for  doubting  ;  after  such  say- 
ings and  such  deeds  as  these  the  history  of  the  early 
Church  and  its  slow  perception  of  the  universal  char- 
acter of  the  Gospel  is  hardly  to  be  understood.  Nor 
is  Jesus  likely  in  any  case  to  have  amused  himself  by 
speaking  thus  to  a  dissolute  Samaritan  woman,  to 
whom  his  words  must  have  been  without  meaning ; 
it  is  to  the  reader  they  are  spoken  rather  than  to  the 
woman.  The  questions  of  the  woman,  the  remark  of 
the  disciples,  the  approach  of  the  Samaritans,  every 
thing  serves  as  an  occasion  for  this  spiritual  teaching. 
But  the  woman's  words,  however  well  they  serve  this 
purpose,  are  not  very  probable  in  themselves.  The 
comparison  with  Jacob,  the  theological  question  about 
the  place  of  worship,  are  brought  in  somewhat  vie- 


io6       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

lently ;  and  one  remark  in  particular,  when  she  is 
made  to  say,  "  Give  me  this  water  that  I  thirst  not," 
is  all  the  more  likely  to  be  a  device  of  the  author's,  as 
he  uses  it  again  when  he  makes  the  Jews  ask,  "  Ever- 
more give  us  this  bread."  Then  also  the  reply  of 
Jesus  to  his  disciples,  which  gives  him  the  appearance 
of  rejecting  the  food  which  they  have  brought  to  him, 
seems  in  the  connection  a  little  artificial  for  Jesus  to 
have  said,  for  Jesus  is  not  ordinarily  so  fond  of  an  epi- 
gram that  he  will  give  a  wrong  impression  in  order  to 
get  a  chance  to  bring  it  in.  And  the  words  about  the 
harvest  also,  which  certainly  seem  to  be  closely  con- 
nected with  what  goes  before,  make  no  account  of  the 
time  which  must  have  passed  before  the  Samaritans 
could  come  in  sight.  But  what  points  most  clearly  to 
an  account  which  is  symbolic  and  ideal  is  the  strange 
saying  about  the  woman's  past  life.  This  knowledge 
on  the  part  of  Jesus  is  a  little  troublesome,  even  though 
one  holds  to  the  miracles  ;  if  for  no  other  reason  because 
it  is  something  exceptional,  because  Jesus  certainly 
depended  for  the  most  part  upon  natural  means  of 
knowledge.  But  it  seems  to  us  quite  plain  that  we 
have  here  nothing  but  an  allegory  of  the  Samaritan 
nation,  that  the  five  husbands  are  the  five  religions 
which,  according  to  the  book  of  Kings,  the  Samaritan 
settlers  brought  in,  and  that  the  sixth  is  the  pseudo- 
Jehovah  whom  they  now  were  worshipping. 

If  now,  after  all  the  trouble  that  we  have  been  to, 
nothing  else  is  plain,  this  at  least  will  have  been  made 
clear,  that  if  indeed  we  have  to  do  with  history  at  all, 
at  least  it  is  with  history  of  a  special  sort,  history 
which  only  is  cared  about  as  it  expresses  an  idea. 
That  there  should  be  no  doubt  about  this  our  author 
tells  us  himself  that  it  is  so,  for  he  says  that  he  has 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  107 

written  that  his  readers  may  believe  that  Jesus  is  the 
Son  of  God.  Nor  has  he  left  it  doubtful  what  the 
Son  of  God  means  to  him  ;  at  the  head  of  his  book  he 
has  put  a  prologue  in  which  briefly  his  philosophy  is 
summed  up.  God,  says  our  author,  is  pure  Spirit, 
whom  no  man  can  know  directly.  But  God  has 
revealed  himself  through  a  mediator,  his  Word, 
through  whom  the  world  was  made,  and  who  partakes 
of  the  nature  of  God  himself.  But  the  world  refused 
to  know  God,  and  to  lead  men  into  light  and  life  the 
Word  became  flesh  in  the  person  of  Jesus,  To  all 
who  came  to  him  he  gave  eternal  life,  a  life  which 
consists  in  perfect  communion  with  God  through  him  ; 
but  all  men  did  not  accept  him,  and  there  came  about 
a  conflict  between  light  and  darkness,  between  life  and 
death,  God  and  the  Devil.  And  so  to  the  world  this 
appearance  of  the  lyOgos  proved  a  judgment,  and  a 
judgment  which  was  consummated  in  the  very  act  by 
which  darkness  seemed  to  triumph,  by  the  death  on 
the  cross.  This  very  briefly  is  the  argument  of  the 
book,  though  of  course  such  an  outline  does  no  justice 
to  its  sublime  and  profoundly  spiritual  conceptions  ; 
but  what  we  wish  especially  to  point  out  is  that  the 
author's  philosophy  is  not  a  philosophy  which  hangs 
in  the  air,  which  is  something  new  with  Christian 
thinkers,  but  that  it  has  its  roots  in  a  definite  school 
of  thought  which  at  that  time  was  exerting  a  deep 
influence  over  men,  the  Alexandrian  philosophy  of 
Philo.  We  do  not  mean  by  this  that  the  Fourth  Gos- 
pel is  only  a  reproduction  of  Alexandrian  speculations, 
for,  on  the  contrary,  the  essential  thing  in  the  Gospel, 
the  incarnation  of  the  lyOgos,  is  profoundly  original 
with  it ;  but  still  in  its  whole  mode  of  thought,  in  its 
conception  of  God  and  the  universe,  it  is  to  Philo  that 


io8       The  Life  and  Teachiiigs  of  Jesus. 

the  Gospel  undoubtedly  goes  back.  And  now  with 
this  thought  before  us,  that  our  author  is  a  man  versed 
in  the  Alexandrian  thought  of  his  day,  who  thinks  he 
has  found  the  key  to  that  philosophy,  its  crowning 
glor}^,  in  the  person  of  Jesus,  we  may  gather  up  the 
loose  threads  of  our  examination,  and  see  what  light  it 
casts  upon  them.  Now  we  are  ready  to  see  how  com- 
pletely the  book  is  a  work  of  art  centring  about  this 
one  great  idea,  how  even  in  the  details  of  its  structure 
the  skill  of  the  artist  appears,  with  the  dependence  on 
the  number  three  which  runs  through  the  book.  We 
see  how  a  great  drama  unfolds  itself  before  us,  the 
rise,  the  progress,  and  the  culmination  of  the  conflict 
between  light  and  darkness  ;  we  see  how  everywhere 
symbol  determines  the  choice  of  the  materials,  how 
one  miracle  shows  Jesus  as  the  source  of  light,  another 
as  the  source  of  life,  how  one  points  to  his  body  and 
another  to  his  blood,  how  the  unbelief  of  the  Jews 
stands  over  against  the  receptiveness  of  the  Gentiles. 
And  finally  w^e  understand  how  the  speeches,  no  longer 
to  be  forced  painfully  into  the  framework  of  the  older 
Gospels,  are  only  the  vehicles  of  the  author's  thought, 
and  serve  to  put  it  clearly  and  dramaticall}^  before  us. 

But  still,  one  maj^  saj-,  is  it  not  possible  that  even  so 
the  Gospel  may  have  been  written  by  an  Apostle  ?  may 
not  John  during  his  stay  in  Ephesus  have  come  in  con- 
tact with  the  Alexandrian  philosoph)^  have  absorbed  it 
and  filled  it  out  in  just  this  way,  may  he  not  have  made 
a  choice  of  his  material  for  this  purpose,  and  have  had 
a  perfect  right  to  do  so  ?  That  such  a  thing  is  impos- 
sible we  will  not  sa5^  but  probable  it  certainlj^  is  not, 
and  to  understand  why  it  is  improbable,  apart  from 
what  has  been  said  already,  let  us  look  at  it  a  little 
more  closely.      Now  there  are  several  arguments  that 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  109 

have  been  urged  against  John's  authorship  which  we 
shall  not  attempt  to  defend.  Thus  many  critics,  and 
among  them  Mr.  Arnold,  have  insisted  that  the  author 
could  not  have  been  a  Jew  ;  to  us  it  seems  that  he  could 
not  well  have  been  anything  else.  The  Greek  of  the 
Gospel  appears  to  show  this,  and  so  too  does  the  un- 
doubted knowledge  which  the  author  has  of  Jewish 
customs  and  beliefs,  and  even  of  Palestine  itself.  We 
do  not  feel  quite  sure  that  all  his  references  are  correct, 
but  at  least  his  mistakes  are  so  few  that  it  would  be 
hazardous  to  lay  any  stress  upon  them,  least  of  all  upon 
the  two  mistakes  which  have  been  insisted  on  the  most. 
The  author  speaks  of  a  Bethany  beyond  Jordan,  and  it 
is  supposed  that  he  means  the  well-known  Bethany  near 
Jerusalem,  and  makes  a  blunder  in  the  situation.  He 
speaks  of  Caiaphas  as  the  ' '  high-priest  of  that  year, ' ' 
and  it  is  supposed  that  he  confounds  the  Jewish  cus- 
toms with  that  of  Asia  Minor,  where  there  was  a  high- 
priest  who  was  elected  yearly.  But  when  repeatedly 
he  speaks  of  the  better  known  Bethany  without  any 
qualifying  phrase,  and  shows  that  he  knows  its  situa- 
tion, and  when  he  seems  to  distinguish  this  from 
another  Bethany,  a  Bethany  "beyond  Jordan,"  it  is 
easiest  to  suppose  that  really  he  does  mean  to  speak  of 
two  towns  of  the  same  name  ;  though  whether  this 
second  Bethany,  which  never  has  been  discovered, 
actually  existed,  is  another  question.  And  as  for  the 
other  statement  which  he  makes,  the  statement  about 
the  high-priest,  we  cannot  help  feeling  it  a  little  im- 
probable that  any  one,  Jew  or  Greek,  who  had  so  good 
a  knowledge  of  Jewish  affairs  as  our  author  certainly 
had,  should  have  been  ignorant  about  so  very  simple 
and  notorious  a  fact  as  this,  not  a  thing  that  we  could 
easily  credit,  unless  we  were  driven  to  it  through  lack 


I  lo       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

of  any  other  explanation.  And  it  is  not,  we  think, 
wholly  imagination  which  sees  something  of  a  tragic 
significance  in  those  words  "  the  high-priest  of  that 
year,"  the  Death  Year.  Such  a  touch  we  should  per- 
haps not  look  for  in  an  Evangelist  like  the  first  three 
Evangelists,  but  in  our  author  it  is  quite  what  we 
should  expect.  Just  so  he  is  telling  us  in  another 
place  how  Jesus  points  out  the  traitor  to  the  disciple 
who  is  leaning  on  his  breast,  and  he  adds,  "  He  then, 
having  received  the  sop,  went  immediately  out :  and  it 
was  7iight."  Our  author,  moreover,  is  well  acquainted 
with  the  Old  Testament,  and  perhaps  he  quotes  it  once 
or  twice  from  the  original  ;  he  appeals  to  it  constantly 
for  fulfilment  of  prophec}',  and  it  tinges  the  most  of 
his  conceptions.  Critics,  it  is  true,  when  Jesus  speaks 
of  ' '  all  who  had  come  before  him  "  as  "  thieves  and 
robbers,"  have  tried  to  make  the  Evangelist  responsi- 
ble for  a  very  bitter  and  uncompromising  spirit  of  anti- 
Judaism,  but  this  is  unfair  to  the  whole  spirit  of  the 
book.  On  the  contrary,  of  the  divine  character  of  the 
old  religion  he  speaks  often  and  strongly.  The  Scrip- 
tures cannot  be  broken,  they  testify  of  Jesus,  Moses 
and  the  prophets  wrote  of  him,  Abraham  rejoiced  to 
see  his  day,  the  Temple  is  to  Jesus  his  Father's  house, 
Israel  is  ra  i'dia,  God's  own  possession,  salvation 
is  of  the  Jews.  It  is  very  true  indeed  that  the  Evange- 
list is  no  longer  a  Jew  in  sentiment,  and  his  theology  is 
the  most  spiritual  and  universal,  the  freest  from  national 
limitations,  of  any  that  is  to  be  found  in  the  New  Tes- 
tament. In  general,  however,  it  appears  that  these  pro- 
founder  views  of  his  are  added  to  the  popular  concep- 
tions rather  than  take  the  place  of  them.  Belief  in  Jesus 
because  Jesus'  words  are  true  he  places  above  belief 
in  miracles,  but  belief  in  miracles  he  does  not  reject. 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  1 1 1 

Jesus  is  the  resurrection  and  the  life,  a  resurrection  and 
life  which  is  ours  here  and  now ;  but  he  also  believes 
in  a  resurrection  at  the  last  day.  And  with  all  his  per- 
ception that  the  kingdom  of  heaven  is  essentially  a 
spiritual  thing,  he  probably  holds,  as  all  the  early 
church  held,  to  a  speedy  second  coming  of  the  Ivord. 
What  is  somewhat  more  significant,  a  point  which  Mr. 
Arnold  specially  relies  upon,  is  a  certain  manner  of 
speaking  which  the  writer  adopts  toward  the  Jewish 
people  and  their  beliefs,  which,  so  Mr.  Arnold  thinks, 
a  true  Jew  never  could  have  brought  himself  to  use. 
So  he  speaks  of  the  manner  of  the  purifying  of  the 
Jews,  of  a  dispute  between  some  of  John's  disciples 
and  a  Jew  about  purifying,  of  the  Jews'  Passover,  the 
Preparation  of  the  Jews.  Jesus  recalls  to  his  disciples 
words  which  he  had  spoken  to  the  Jews,  and  to  the  Jews 
themselves  he  speaks  of  "your  law."  That  Mr.  Ar- 
nold has  put  more  emphasis  upon  these  facts  than 
naturally  they  will  bear  there  can  be  no  doubt ;  but 
perhaps  it  is  true  that  in  an  ordinary  case,  such  a  case, 
say,  as  that  of  the  Englishman  whom  Mr.  Arnold  sup- 
poses, we  should  not  expect  a  man  to  speak  in  quite 
so  objective  a  way  of  his  own  nation  as  the  author  of 
the  Fourth  Gospel  speaks  of  the  Jews.  But  then  this 
hardly  is  an  ordinary  case.  For  as  Judaism  was  a 
religion  quite  as  much  as  it  was  a  national  bond,  it 
would  not  be  hard  for  a  Jew  of  the  Dispersion,  even 
for  a  Jew  of  Palestine,  to  grow  strange  to  it,  if  he  had 
lived  in  an  atmosphere  of  Greek  culture,  and  had 
allowed  the  peculiarities  of  Jewish  belief  to  drop  away  ; 
and  most  of  all  this  would  be  easy  if  he  were  a  Chris- 
tian, now  that  Christianity  stood  in  open  antagonism 
to  the  Jewish  nation.  But  it  is  when  we  come  to  apply 
this  to  the  Apostle  John  that  we  begin  to  feel  its  diffi- 


112       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

culty,  for  all  the  conditions  which  make  it  possible  are 
signally  lacking  in  the  case  of  John.  There  is  no 
evidence  that  John  in  his  conception  of  Christianity 
differed  essentially  from  the  rest  of  the  Apostles  ;  on 
the  other  hand  there  is  good  evidence  that  he  did  not 
differ.  For  when  Paul  came  to  Jerusalem  ' '  after  four- 
teen 5^ears,"  he  found  John  still  in  the  city,  working 
alongside  of  Peter  and  James,  a  pillar-Apostle  with 
them.  Plainly  he  is  mentioned  as  one  who  confined 
himself  to  the  Jews,  who  still  looked  on  Christianity 
as  a  form  of  Judaism.  Now  if  John  went  to  Ephesus 
between  60  and  70  a.d.,  no  doubt  we  might  expect 
that  his  new  surroundings  would  have  some  effect 
upon  him,  that  he  would  be  broadened  a  little,  and 
that  some  of  his  prejudices  would  fall  away.  But 
still  we  must  set  a  limit  to  this  ;  environment  will  do 
much,  but  it  will  not  work  miracles,  it  will  not  change 
a  man  into  his  exact  opposite,  and  least  of  all  will  it 
do  this  when  he  has  reached  the  decline  of  life  and 
his  real  work  is  behind  him.  We  should  be  surprised 
if  Alexandrianism  were  to  influence  him  decidedly  in 
any  way  ;  but  that  it  should  destroy  his  early  stand- 
point altogether,  that  it  should  lead  him  to  a  univer- 
salism  beyond  that  of  Paul  himself,  that  from  a  con- 
ception of  Christianity  as  a  religion  for  the  Jews  it 
should  turn  him  to  a  conception  of  Christianity  as  first 
of  all  for  the  Gentiles,  that  those  for  whom  he  had 
spent  the  best  of  his  life  in  working  should  now  be  set 
aside  with  no  trace  of  sympathy  or  regret,  this  seems 
hardly  to  be  credible.  And  the  fact  that  this  uni- 
versalism  goes  back  ostensibly  to  words  of  Jesus' 
makes  it  all  the  harder  to  understand ;  that  John 
should  have  taken  twenty  or  thirty  years  to  discover 
their  meaning  is  surely  strange,  and  it  throws  great 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  113 

doubt  upon  the  words  themselves.  So  that,  taking  the 
probabilities  fairly,  it  does  not  appear  that  the  Gospel 
can  have  been  written  by  one  of  the  Apostles  them- 
selves, but  it  is  much  more  likely  to  have  come  from 
some  one  who  had  grown  up  in  the  atmosphere  of  later 
conceptions,  and  who  did  not  need  to  have  so  violent 
a  change  brought  about  in  his  ways  of  thinking. 

Now  when  one  comes  to  this  conclusion  he  will  find 
a  number  of  other  things  in  the  Gospel  which  it  will 
throw  light  upon.  For  one  thing  it  will  make  it  easier 
for  him  to  account  for  the  unusual  wa)'  in  which  John 
is  spoken  of  as  the  ' '  disciple  whom  Jesus  loved. ' '  This 
we  never  have  been  able  to  look  upon  as  an  expression 
which  could  be  wholly  justified  in  a  man's  own  mouth, 
even  if  Jesus  really  had  shown  a  very  marked  favorit- 
ism, which  for  several  reasons  must  be  considered 
doubtful.  Then  in  another  place  John  is  spoken  of 
as  ' '  known  to  the  high-priest, ' '  a  statement  which  is 
much  more  likely  to  have  been  written  when  the  his- 
torical conditions  had  grown  dim  and  uncertain,  than 
to  have  come  from  the  fisherman  himself.  True,  the 
commentators  have  found  this  only  means  that  John 
was  accustomed  to  supply  the  high-priest's  kitchen 
with  fish,  a  thing  in  itself  not  quite  impossible,  if  only 
this  were  what  the  author  said.  But  these  things  we 
will  pass  by,  for  there  is  a  much  more  important  ques- 
tion that  must  be  considered.  The  whole  possibility 
that  John  could  have  written  the  Gospel  depends  upon 
the  statement  that  he  passed  his  last  years  in  Ephesus, 
and  if  this  tradition  is  not  true  the  entire  case  for  the 
genuineness  of  the  book  falls  to  the  ground.  We  hesi- 
tate a  little  to  contradict  this  tradition  ;  in  upholding  a 
theory  which  Mr.  Arnold  has  set  aside  as  a  "  vigorous 
and  rigorous ' '   theory,  we  suppose  that  to  many  we 


114       T^^^  Z?/^  and  Teachings  of  yesus. 

shall  seem  to  be  attempting  a  tour  de  force  which  we 
hardly  would  venture  to  attempt  if  our  view  of  the 
Gospel  did  not  make  it  necessary  for  us.  However,  let 
us  first  consider  how  the  question  stands,  and  then  we, 
shall  be  able  to  determine  better  whether  Mr.  Arnold 
is  right  in  settling  it  in  such  an  off-hand  way. 

What  then  is  the  evidence  in  favor  of  the  tradition  ? 
Apparently  it  is  very  strong  indeed,  no  less  than  the 
unanimous  testimou}'^  of  the  Fathers  from  the  last  part 
of  the  second  century  onward.  One  of  these  Fathers 
is  a  bishop  in  the  very  church  where  John  is  supposed 
to  have  lived,  anecdotes  are  told  about  the  Apostle,  he 
is  cited  in  support  of  a  certain  opinion.  But  clearest 
and  most  unequivocal  of  all  is  the  testimonj^  of  Irenaeus, 
so  very  clear  and  definite  that  with  it  the  tradition  will 
have  to  stand  or  fall.  Now  Irenaeus  tells  us  that  John, 
the  disciple  of  the  Lord,  published  a  Gospel  during  his 
residence  in  Asia,  and  again  that  the  Church  of  Ephesus 
had  John  remaining  among  them  permanently  until  the 
times  of  Trajan.  Papias,  he  tells  us,  was  a  disciple  of 
John's,  and  he  gives  a  saying  which  Papias  had  heard 
from  the  Apostle.  But  what  seems  quite  conclusive, 
Irenaeus  remembers  in  his  boyhood  to  have  heard  Poly- 
carp,  who  also,  he  says,  was  a  disciple  of  John,  and  he 
can  recall  how  Polycarp  used  to  speak  of  his  familiar 
intercourse  with  John  and  with  the  rest  of  those  who 
had  seen  the  Lord.  Have  we  the  right  to  ask  for  any 
better  evidence  than  this,  the  words  of  a  man  who  is 
within  a  single  generation  of  John,  and  who  has  re- 
ceived his  information  directly  from  one  who  knew 
John  himself. 

But  before  we  stop  here  satisfied  with  our  results,  let 
us  consider  for  a  moment  what  sort  of  men  these  are 
whose  testimony  we  are  relying  on.     We  do  not  in  the 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  1 1 5 

least  mean  that  the  early  Fathers  were  men  credulous 
beyond  their  fellows,  men  who  were  incapable  of  ap- 
preciating evidence  or  of  detecting  the  flaws  in  an  argu- 
ment. This  is  not  so  ;  on  the  contrary,  many  of  them 
were  able  and  clever  men,  men  capable  of  reasoning 
acutely,  and  quite  as  good  witness  to  a  fact  as  other 
men  of  their  time  probably  would  have  been.  But 
still  no  one  who  reads  their  writings  can  fail  to  see  at 
once  how  completely  they  are  lacking  in  the  power  to 
weigh  tradition  rightly,  in  the  critical  estimate  of  facts 
which  modern  times  lay  so  much  stress  upon.  The 
Fathers  depend  constantly  upon  tradition,  they  appeal 
to  it  again  and  again,  but  that  they  have  any  apprecia- 
tion of  the  immense  dangers  to  which  tradition  is  ex- 
posed, that  they  reckon  with  the  almost  numberless 
chances  for  error  to  creep  in,  they  hardly  give  us  any 
hint.  When  traditions  come  in  conflict,  then  they  do 
what  they  can  to  reconcile  them,  but  to  go  back  of  this 
and  question  tradition  itself,  to  ask  whether  tradition 
has  good  grounds  for  what  it  says,  seems  very  seldom 
to  occur  to  them  ;  and  this  often  is  as  true  when  they 
are  dealing  with  the  Greek  mythology,  as  when  they 
are  talking  about  the  early  Elders  and  Apostles.  Ex- 
cept in  unusual  cases  it  is  enough  for  them  that  a  state- 
ment has  been  made  by  some  one  who  has  preceded 
them  ;  it  does  not  occur  to  them  to  sift  the  matter  any 
further.  This  clearly  does  not  prevent  them  from 
telling  many  things  that  are  true,  and  the  fact  that 
they  believe  them  true  may  fairly  keep  us  from  reject- 
ing their  statements  where  we  have  no  special  reason 
for  doing  this.  But  it  also  leads  them  into  many  mis- 
takes, and  mistakes  which  are  so  obvious  that  we 
cannot  have  any  doubt  about  their  being  mistakes. 
So  that  to  look  with  suspicion  upon  a  statement  of 


1 1 6       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  fesus. 

theirs,  to  be  read)-  to  reject  it,  however  positively  it 
may  be  made,  if  we  find  that  there  is  good  reason  to 
doubt  it,  is  not  mere  captiousness,  but  is  only  what 
more  than  once  we  are  compelled  to  do.  Is  there 
then  any  reason  to  doubt  this  statement  which 
Irenseus  makes  so  confidently  ?  Yes,  there  is  a  very 
strong  reason,  and  to  understand  what  this  is  we  must 
go  back  to  the  first  part  of  the  century,  to  a  statement 
which  is  made  by  another  Father,  Papias,  the  Bishop 
of  Hierapolis.  This  Papias  was  a  diligent  collector  of 
traditions  which  he  published  in  his  five  books  called 
the  Expositions  of  the  Logia  of  the  Lord,  and  this  book 
Irenaeus  had  before  him.  Now  in  one  extract  Papias 
gives  us  the  sources  of  his  information.  "If  then," 
he  says,  ' '  any  one  who  had  attended  on  the  Elders  came, 
I  asked  minutely  after  their  sayings,  what  Andrew  or 
Peter  said,  or  what  was  said  by  Philip  or  by  Thomas 
or  by  James  or  by  John  or  by  Matthew  or  by  any  other 
of  the  Lord's  disciples  ;  what  things  (or  which  things) 
Aristion  and  the  Presbyter  John,  the  disciples  of  the 
Lord,  sa3^"  This  John  the  Presbyter  was,  it  seems, 
one  of  Papias'  chief  authorities.  ' '  He  asserts, ' '  says 
Eusebius,  who  also  had  read  the  Expositions,  "that 
he  heard  in  person  Aristion  and  the  Presbyter  John. 
Accordingly,  he  mentions  them  frequently  by  name, 
and  in  his  writings  gives  their  traditions. "  Who  then 
was  this  Presbyter  John  ? 

There  can  be  no  doubt  whom  Irenseus  takes  him  to 
be,  for  quite  certainly  he  thinks  that  he  is  the  Apostle. 
"  Papias,"  he  says,  "  who  was  a  hearer  of  John  and  a 
friend  of  Polycarp  ' '  ;  and  when  Irenaeus  speaks  of 
John,  everywhere  he  means  the  Apostle.  This  much, 
therefore,  we  have  to  start  with  ;  and  now  it  is  hardly 
less  certain  that  John,    whose  disciple  Polycarp  had 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  117 

been,  and  whom  Irenaeus  had  heard  Polycarp  speak  of, 
is  this  same  John  the  Presbyter,  whom  we  meet  with 
in  Papias.  Irenaeus,  as  we  have  seen,  clearly  under- 
stands him  to  be  so  ;  in  just  the  same  way  he  calls 
him  the  disciple  of  the  I^ord,  and  he  makes  both 
Papias  and  Polycarp  his  disciples.  And  we  can  see 
that  Irenseus  here  could  not  have  been  mistaken. 
That  Papias  and  Polycarp,  living  at  the  same  time 
and  in  the  same  country,  should  both  have  received 
their  traditions  chiefly  from  a  disciple  of  the  I^ord 
named.  John,  that  neither  should  have  shown  the 
least  acquaintanceship  with  more  than  one  John,  and 
yet  that  these  Johns  should  have  been  different  per- 
sons, is  highly  improbable.  So  that  this  also  we  may 
look  at  as  settled,  unless  we  should  find  exceedingly 
strong  evidence  on  the  other  side,  that  whenever  any- 
thing is  said  about  a  John  in  Asia  Minor,  it  every- 
where has  reference  to  a  single  man. 

Now  let  us  go  back  to  the  testimony  of  Papias  and 
look  at  it  once  more  in  the  light  of  the  conclusions  we 
have  reached.  There  are  only  two  interpretations  we 
can  put  upon  this  testimony.  It  certainly  is  to  John 
the  Presbyter,  that  Irengeus,  and  therefore  the  whole 
tradition  of  the  second  century,  refers  ;  and  it  may  be 
that  Irenaeus  is  right,  and  that  the  Presbyter  is  none 
other  than  the  Apostle  himself.  But  if  the  Presbyter 
is  not  the  Apostle,  then  the  evidence  for  the  residence 
of  John  in  Asia  Minor  falls  away  at  once  ;  indeed, 
this  residence  is  really  excluded  by  what  Papias 
says.  The  Apostle  John,  along  with  the  other  Apos- 
tles, Papias  has  just  mentioned,  and  he  has  called  them, 
too,  by  the  same  name,  presbyters  ;  so  that  if  his  read- 
ers had  been  familiar  with  the  Apostle  as  one  who, 
within  their  own  recollection,  had  lived  among  them, 


1 1 8       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  jfesus. 


Papias  could  not  have  brought  in  another  John  in  this 
way,  without  a  single  mark  to  distinguish  him,  as  if  he 
were  the  only  John  whom  his  readers  were  acquainted 
with.  The  fact  that  he  does  bring  him  in  in  this  way, 
shows  that  his  readers  were  in  no  danger  of  supposing 
that  by  any  possibility  he  could  have  got  his  information 
direct  from  the  Apostle.  Is  then  Irenaeus  right,  when 
he  makes  an  Apostle  out  of  John  the  Presbyter  ?  This  is 
what  now  must  be  decided. 

Well,  taking  the  words  in  Papias  by  themselves,  it 
is  pretty  clear  that  no  one  would  be  likely  to  come  to 
this  conclusion,  Papias  has  already  spoken  of  the 
Apostle  John,  and  when  now  in  the  same  list  he  men- 
tions John  again,  we  cannot  easily  help  referring  it  to 
another  person.  We  might  suppose,  it  is  true,  that 
Papias  is  distinguishing  what  indirectly  he  had  heard 
about  John,  and  what  he  had  heard  directly  from  John 
himself,  and  this  perhaps  is  not  impossible  ;  but  still  it 
is  far  from  being  natural.  The  words  themselves,  then, 
do  not  naturally  fit  into  Irena^us'  interpretation,  and 
indeed  the  only  real  argument  that  there  is  for  that 
interpretation  is  the  unlikelihood  that  Irenaeus  could 
have  been  mistaken.  Is  it  conceivable,  we  are  asked, 
that  Irenseus,  who  with  his  own  ears  had  heard  Poly- 
carp  tell  of  his  intercourse  with  John,  could  have  com- 
mitted so  gross  a  mistake  as  to  confound  the  Apostle 
with  an  obscure  presbyter  ?  is  not  such  a  mistake  al- 
most be5'ond  belief?  No,  we  answer,  however  great  a 
blunder  it  may  have  been,  it  is  not,  when  we  consider 
the  circumstances,  by  any  means  inconceivable.  Ire- 
naeus,  so  he  tells  us,  was  only  a  boy  when  he  listened 
to  Polycarp.  Now  he  could  remember  how  Polycarp 
often  had  mentioned  the  name  of  John  and  had  given 
sayings  of  his,  how  he  had  spoken  with  reverence  of 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  119 

him  as  a  man  of  great  age  and  authority,  perhaps  as 
one  who  in  his  youth  had  seen  the  Lord.  And  as 
Irenaeus  recalled  this  in  later  years  there  would  be 
every  inducement  for  him  to  connect  this  name,  as 
tradition  very  likely  before  this  had  connected  it  in 
other  quarters,  with  the  Apostle  John,  and  to  bring 
the  traditions  upon  which  he  laid  such  emphasis  into 
direct  contact  with  the  Twelve.  To  be  sure  we  should 
not  accuse  him  of  a  blunder  like  this  if  there  did  not 
seem  to  be  good  reason  for  doing  so  ;  but  the  blunder 
is  not  inconceivable,  it  is  capable  of  being  accounted 
for. 

And  that  Irenseus  did  make  a  blunder  seems  to  us 
to  be  almost  certain,  for  to  make  Papias'  words  refer  to 
the  Apostle  John  is  very  difficult  indeed.  In  the  first 
place  it  is  strange  that  Papias  should  call  John  a 
"  presbyter,"  and  "  a  disciple  of  the  Lord,"  but  not  an 
Apostle.  It  is  true  that  just  before  he  speaks  of  the 
Apostles  in  a  body  as  "  presbyters,"  but  this  is  a  very 
different  thing  from  selecting  this  title  again  and  again 
to  name  a  particular  Apostle  who  is  his  direct  author- 
ity, and  in  itself  the  use  of  the  word  shows  that  to 
Papias  the  Apostles  belonged  to  a  past  generation, 
which  could  be  spoken  of  indefinitely  as  "  elders." 
But  when  he  speaks  of  the  Presbyter  John,  and  denies 
this  title  to  Aristion,  he  apparently  is  referring  to  the 
ecclesiastical  ofl&ce  which  John  filled,  and  this  he 
hardly  would  have  done  if  John  also  had  been  an 
Apostle.  And  then  again  the  way  in  which  John  is 
brought  in  after  the  unknown  Aristion  is  quite  incon- 
ceivable if  he  were  one  of  the  Twelve.  And  for  this 
conclusion,  which  surely  we  must  come  to  if  we  depend 
upon  the  passage  itself,  we  fortunately  are  not  left 
without    a  witness.      Eusebius,    who  had  the  whole 


1 20       The  Life  and  TeacJiitigs  of  Jesus. 


work  before  him,  and  who  had  carefully  examined  it, 
says  distinctly  that  Irenaeus  had  made  a  mistake,  and 
that  John  was  not  John  the  Apostle,  but  another  man. 
Now  when  we  remember  that  Papias  often  mentions 
John  and  gives  many  traditions  which  had  been  re- 
ceived from  him,  we  see  how  improbable  it  is  that 
Eusebius  could  have  made  a  mistake  about  this. 
Papias  could  not  have  had  an  Apostle's  authority  back 
of  him,  and  still  have  left  his  readers  in  any  doubt 
about  it ;  Apostolic  authority  was  not  valued  so  lightly 
in  the  second  centur5^  The  fact  that  it  was  not  made 
plain,  that  even  a  possibility  was  left  for  doubting  it, 
shows  conclusively  that  it  was  not  the  Apostle  John  of 
whom  Papias  was  speaking.  And  we  have  another 
extract  from  Papias  which  points  to  this  same  thing, 
a  long  saying  about  the  millennium  which  is  attributed 
to  Jesus,  and  which  Papias  says  was  told  by  John.  If 
John  was  the  Apostle  then  this  chain  of  testimony  is 
unusually  strong,  and  yet  the  saying  is  certainly  not 
genuine,  and  could  not  have  come  from  Jesus  at  all ; 
so  that  John  again  hardly  could  have  been  the  Apostle. 
So  then,  however  gross  the  blunder  may  seem  to  us, 
a  blunder  we  nevertheless  must  suppose  that  Irenseus 
has  made,  upon  the  testimony  of  Eusebius  and  of  Papias 
alike.  Irenseus  has  no  other  proof  to  give  for  the  tra- 
dition of  John's  residence  in  Asia  Minor,  only  a  pas- 
sage in  Papias  which  reallj^  tells  the  other  waJ^  and 
the  presence  in  Asia  many  years  before  of  a  disciple  of 
the  Eord  named  John.  The  interest  which  Irenaeus 
had  in  believing  this  to  be  the  Apostle  is  evident,  and 
we  can  see  now  how  it  influenced  him,  how  indefinitely 
he  speaks  of  Polycarp's  intercourse  with  John  and  the 
rest  of  those  who  had  seen  the  Lord,  how  an  Apostle 
grows  into  Apostles  a7id  many  who  had  see?i  Christ,  how 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  1 2 1 

Polycarp  was  appointed  by  Apostles  as  bishop  of 
Smyrna.  But  Polycarp,  even  if  John  as  the  last  of  the 
Apostles  had  lived  nearly  to  the  second  century,  could 
hardly  have  been  much  more  than  thirty  when  John 
died,  so  that  his  instruction  by  other  Apostles  is  almost 
out  of  the  question,  and  least  of  all  could  he  have  been 
made  bishop  of  Smyrna  by  Apostles.  The  whole  of 
Irenseus'  statement  must  be  given  up,  as  Eusebius 
long  ago  saw  that  it  must  so  far  as  Papias  is  concerned  ; 
only  we  must  recognize  also,  what  Eusebius  failed  to 
see,  that  with  it  goes  the  proof  of  a  residence  of  the 
Apostle  John  in  Asia  Minor. 

If  John  then  did  not  write  the  Fourth  Gospel,  where 
are  we  to  look  for  the  author  ?  at  what  time  did  the 
Gospel  arise  ?  The  question  is  difl&cult  to  answer,  and 
perhaps  it  cannot  be  answered  at  all  in  a  way  that  is 
wholly  satisfactory.  There  is  no  external  testimony  of 
the  slightest  value  which  points  to  any  one  except  the 
Apostle,  nor  will  we  deny  that  the  testimony  to  the 
genuineness  of  the  book  is  of  some  weight.  To  start 
with  the  last  quarter  of  the  second  century,  we  find 
our  four  Gospels  in  full  possession  of  the  field.  They 
are  unquestioned,  they  have  no  rivals,  they  are  held  as 
sacred.  So  much  no  one  denies,  and  it  is  important  to 
remember  this  because  it  is  just  for  the  reason  that 
critics  have  lost  sight  of  these  broad  facts  and  have 
plunged  themselves  into  details,  that  they  have  come  to 
such  different  conclusions.  For  when  we  come  down 
still  farther,  to  Justin  Martyr,  about  the  middle  of  the 
century,  we  find  that  he  too  has  Gospels  which  he  ap- 
peals to  as  authority  for  his  facts,  "  Memoirs,"  he  calls 
them,  anofAvripiovavjAaTa,  composed  by  the  Apostles 
of  Christ  and  their  companions.  That  he  is  referring 
here  to  certain  definite  books,  and  that  too  to  books 


1 22       The  Life  a7id  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

which  were  held  in  no  small  esteem,  is  plain,  for  he 
says :  ' '  On  the  day  called  Sunday  all  who  live  in  cities 
or  in  the  country  gather  together  to  one  place,  and  the 
Memoirs  by  the  Apostles  or  the  writings  of  the  Proph- 
ets are  read  as  long  as  time  permits. "  Is  it  then  still 
our  Gospels  that  he  means,  and  so  invests  with  Apos- 
tolic authority  ?  To  this  question  many  scholars  have 
answered  no,  and  the  reasons  for  their  answer  are 
briefly  these,  that  Justin's  quotations  very  seldom  cor- 
respond exactly  with  our  Gospels,  and  that  a  few  of 
the  facts  which  he  mentions,  the  statement,  for  exam- 
ple, that  Jesus  was  born  in  a  cave,  or  that  the  Magi 
came  from  Arabia,  are  not  to  be  found  in  our  Gospels 
at  all.  Into  this  question  we  do  not  care  to  go,  but  it 
seems  quite  plain  to  us  that,  however  Justin  may  have 
obtained  isolated  facts,  his  real  sources,  those  which  he 
refers  to  under  the  name  ' '  Memoirs, ' '  were  none  other 
than  our  Gospels.  And  without  entering  into  any 
minute  inquiry  we  can  easily  see  why  this  must  almost 
needs  be  so ;  we  cannot  readil)^  conceive  that  books 
which  were  looked  upon  with  such  high  esteem  could, 
within  twenty-five .  years,  have  given  place  to  other 
books,  which  still  could  be  described  in  just  the  same 
terms.  It  cannot  be  denied  that  the  evidence  for  the 
Fourth  Gospel  is  much  weaker  than  the  evidence  for 
the  other  three  ;  still  that  Justin  does  use  it,  and  use 
it  more  than  once,  there  can  be  no  reasonable  doubt. 
So  he  says  in  speaking  of  baptism  :  "  For  Christ  also 
said,  '  Except  ye  be  born  again  ye  shall  in  no  wise  enter 
into  the  kingdom  of  heaven.'  But  that  it  is  impos- 
sible for  those  who  have  once  been  born  to  enter  into 
the  wombs  of  those  who  brought  them  forth,  is  man- 
ifest to  all."  The  quotation  is  not  exact,  but  the  last 
clause  shows  that  he  must  have  taken  it  from  John  ; 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  123 

and  apart  from  this  there  are  at  least  nine  or  ten  other 
allusions  which  cannot  be  explained  plausibly  except 
as  going  back  to  the  Fourth  Gospel.  That  Justin  used 
the  Fourth  Gospel,  then,  we  must  regard  as  certain ; 
but  it  still  may  be  asked  whether  there  is  any  evidence 
that  he  regarded  it  as  John's.  Yes,  we  think  that  this 
too  must  be  answered  in  the  affirmative,  for  unless  in 
Justin's  time  there  had  been  a  strong  tendency  to  look 
upon  the  book  as  the  work  of  an  Apostle,  we  cannot 
well  explain  how  twenty-five  years  later  the  book  was 
accepted  without  any  trace  of  doubt.  But  while  we 
are  ready  to  admit  this,  we  think  that  it  is  very  much 
more  doubtful  whether  in  Justin's  time  the  book  was 
already  beyond  suspicion,  and  stood  quite  on  a  level 
with  the  other  Gospels,  for  otherwise  it  is  difficult  to 
explain  the  very  sparing  use  which  Justin  makes  of  it, 
a  use  which  will  appear  the  more  strange  when  we 
compare  it  with  the  lavish  quotations  of  Irenseus,  a 
few  years  later.  Already  then  at  the  time  of  Justin 
the  book  probably  was  looked  upon  as  John's,  but  it 
still  was  used  very  hesitatingly,  and  possibly  it  was 
not  yet  read  in  the  churches  along  with  the  other 
Gospels. 

So  much  for  Justin.  And  before  Justin's  time 
unfortunately  the  literature  which  we  have  is  very 
meagre.  Still  there  are  witnesses,  and  the  most  im- 
portant of  these  is  Papias.  But  Papias  does  not  men- 
tion the  Fourth  Gospel  in  any  of  the  extracts  which 
Eusebius  has  preserved  for  us,  and  consequently  we 
are  led  to  suppose  that  he  did  not  mention  it  at  all,  for 
if  he  had  mentioned  it,  Eusebius  would  have  been 
most  likely  to  tell  us  of  it.  So  some  critics  have  come 
to  the  conclusion  that  Papias  either  did  not  know  of 
the  Gospel,  or  at  any  rate  that  he  did  not  accept  it  as 


124       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  yesus. 

genuine,  and  that  accordingly  we  have  here  at  last  an 
indication  of  the  time  when  the  Gospel  made  its  ap- 
pearance. Is  this  a  necessary  inference,  or  is  it  even  a 
very  probable  one  ? 

Papias  tells  us  :  "I  shall  not  be  unwilling  to  put  down 
along  with  my  interpretation  whatever  instructions  I  re- 
ceived at  any  time  from  the  Elders,  and  stored  up  in  my 
memory,  assuring  you  at  the  same  time  of  their  truth. 
For  I  did  not,  like  the  multitude,  take  pleasure  in  those 
who  spoke  much,  but  in  those  who  taught  the  truth, 
nor  in  those  who  related  strange  commandments,  but 
in  those  who  rehearsed  the  commandments  given  by 
the  Lord  to  faith,  and  proceeding  from  truth  itself. 
If  then  any  one  who  had  attended  on  the  Elders  came, 
I  asked  minutely  after  their  sayings,  what  Andrew  or 
Peter  said,  or  what  was  said  by  Philip  or  by  Thomas 
or  by  James  or  by  John  or  by  Matthew  or  by  any  other 
of  the  Lord's  disciples  ;  what  Aristion  and  the  Presbyter 
John,  the  disciples  of  the  Eord,  say.  For  I  imagined 
what  was  to  be  got  from  books  was  not  so  profitable  to 
me  as  what  came  from  the  living  and  abiding  voice." 
Now  what  are  we  to  gather  from  these  words  ?  Appar- 
ently this,  that  Papias  was  concerned  to  glean  from  a 
tradition  now  fast  becoming  a  second-hand  tradition 
any  facts  that  he  might  pick  up  which  related  more  es- 
pecially to  the  commandments,  the  teachings  of  Jesus.  He 
is  not  interested  in  giving  us  an  account  of  the  Christian 
literature,  and  indeed  he  tells  us  that  for  this  he  does 
not  very  much  care.  It  happens  that  he  has  heard  the  El- 
der tell  how  Matthew  and  Mark  wrote  their  Gospels  and 
he  puts  this  down  ;  but  it  is  quite  incidental,  and  of  the 
rest  of  the  rich  literature  which  existed  in  his  da)^  ex- 
cept of  the  Apocalypse,  he  has  nothing  to  say.  And,  sup- 
posing that  the  Gospel  were  genuine,  there  would  be  a 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  125 

special  reason  why,  when  he  spoke  of  Matthew  and  of 
Mark,  he  would  not  be  likely  to  speak  of  the  Fourth 
Gospel  along  with  them.  Papias  is  something  of  an 
antiquarian,  who  is  getting  together  for  his  own 
generation  the  oral  traditions  of  a  preceding  generation 
because  the  men  of  that  generation  are  fast  disappearing. 
Now  was  it  necessary  for  this  aim  that  he  .should  tell 
anything  about  the  Fourth  Gospel  ?  Certainly  it  was 
not.  If  the  Gospel  was  genuine  it  must  have  appeared 
within  his  own  and  other  men's  recollections.  It 
would  be  nothing  he  had  heard  from  the  Elders  but  it 
would  be  a  fact  that  was  well  known,  and  there  would 
be  no  reason  that  would  make  it  necessary  for  him  to 
mention  it.  So  that  the  fact  that  he  did  not  mention  it 
does  not  prove  that  he  did  not  know  it ;  it  simply 
proves  nothing  one  way  or  the  other.  But  may  not 
Papias,  if  he  did  not  speak  of  the  Gospel  directly,  have 
quoted  some  sayings  from  it  among  his  interpretations  ? 
There  is  no  evidence  that  he  did  this,  but  the  fact  that 
Eusebius  does  not  mention  any  such  quotations  does 
not  show  conclusively  that  he  may  not  have  done  it. 
Eusebius  tells  us  that  he  means  to  trace  ' '  what  portions 
of  the  Antilegomena  earlier  writers  had  made  use  of, 
and  what  they  said  about  the  Homologoumena,"  that 
is,  when  he  finds  any  quotations  from  the  Antilegomena, 
the  books  which  were  disputed,  he  promises  that  he  will 
let  us  know  of  them,  but  the  Homologoumena,  the  books 
which  every  one  accepts,  he  will  only  mention  if  he  finds 
some  definite  statement  about  them.  And  the  Fourth 
Gospel  is  one  of  the  Homologoumena.  So  then  our  an- 
swer to  the  question  whether  Papias  knew  the  Gospel 
must  depend  upon  other  data,  if  such  data  exist.  Such 
data  are  very  scanty,  but  so  far  as  they  go  they  tend  to 
answer  the  question  in  the  afiirmative.     If  Papias  does 


126       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 


not  mention  the  Gospel,  we  have  the  testinionj^  of 
Eusebius  that  he  did  know  the  Epistle  and  that  he 
drew  proof  texts  from  it.  Of  course  one  may  say 
to  this  that  Eusebius  made  a  mistake  and  did  not 
know  what  he  was  talking  about,  and  this  indeed 
some  scholars  have  said.  But  such  a  denial  has  no 
evidence  back  of  it,  and  it  is  all  the  more  improba- 
ble as  Polycarp  has  an  undoubted  quotation  from  the 
same  Epistle,  and  Polycarp  lived  at  the  same  time 
that  Papias  lived.  And  in  addition  to  this  is  the 
fact  that,  according  to  all  the  testimony  which  we 
have,  the  heretics  of  the  early  part  of  the  century, 
about  the  j^ear  125,  and  in  particular  Valentinus  and 
Basilides,  who  were  noted  heresiarchs,  already  accepted 
and  made  use  of  the  book.  Here  again  it  is  possible 
to  throw  doubt  upon  the  testimony  ;  Tertullian  and 
Hippolytus,  we  are  told,  the  writers  who  give  us  an 
account  of  these  early  heretics,  are  very  inexact  in 
their  statements,  and  when  they  tell  us  that  Basilides 
or  Valentinus  held  to  this  or  that  opinion  we  cannot 
be  sure  that  they  are  not  mixing  up  the  systems  of 
these  early  heresiarchs  with  those  of  their  later  fol- 
lowers, as  they  sometimes  do  mix  them  up.  Perhaps 
we  may  not  be  sure  about  it,  but  we  hardly  are  satisfied 
to  reject  this  testimony  altogether,  and  on  the  whole  it 
seems  more  probable  that  in  this  case  Tertullian  and 
Hippolytus  are  not  mixing  up  the  systems  of  the  early 
and  of  the  later  heretics,  but  are  giving  the  real  views 
of  BasiHdes  and  of  Valentinus.  By  the  year  125  a.d. 
the  Gospel  was  then  probably  in  existence.  It  was  not 
accepted  at  once,  and  even  in  the' middle  of  the  century 
its  position  was  a  little  doubtful ;  but  with  the  excep- 
tion of  one  small  sect  there  was  no  decided  oppo.sition 
made  to  it.     It  is  true  that  if  John  had  lived  iu  Asia 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  127 


Minor,  and  if  men  were  still  alive  who  had  known 
him,  we  should  find  some  difl&culty  in  accounting  for 
the  acceptance  of  the  book  ;  but  as  it  is  the  thing  is 
inconceivable  only  when  we  carry  back  into  the  second 
century  a  critical  spirit  which  is  quite  foreign  to  the 
times.  The  books  of  the  New  Testament  were  still 
far  from  being  Scripture,  and  Papias  prefers  oral  tra- 
dition to  written  records  in  whatever  relates  to  Christ's 
teachings  ;  a  book  was  valuable  because  it  was  edify- 
ing, and  no  one  thought  of  scrutinizing  carefully  the 
evidence  for  its  antiquity.  Listen  to  the  argument  of 
Tertullian  for  the  apocryphal  Book  of  Enoch.  ' '  I 
suppose,"  he  says,  referring  to  those  who  did  not 
accept  the  book,  "they  did  not  think  that,  having 
been  published  before  the  deluge,  it  could  have  safely 
survived  that  world-wide  calamity,  the  abolisher  of  all 
things.  If  that  is  the  reason,  let  them  recall  to  their 
memory  that  Noah,  the  sur\avor  of  the  deluge,  was 
the  great-grandson  of  Enoch  himself,  and  he  of  course 
had  heard  and  remembered  from  domestic  renown  and 
hereditary  tradition  concerning  his  own  great-grand- 
father's grace  in  the  sight  of  God,  and  concerning  all 
his  preachings,  since  Enoch  had  given  no  other  charge 
to  Methuselah  than  that  he  should  hand  on  the  knowl- 
edge of  them  to  his  posterit>\  If  Noah  had  not  had 
this  by  so  short  a  route,  there  would  still  be  this  con- 
sideration to  warrant  our  assertion  of  the  genuineness 
of  this  Scripture,  he  could  equally  have  renewed  it 
under  the  Spirit's  inspiration,  after  it  had  been  de- 
stroyed by  the  violence  of  the  deluge."  When  rea- 
soning like  this  could  satisfy  one  of  the  acutest  men  of 
his  times,  when  men  did  not  busy  themselves  with  sug- 
gesting doubts,  but  only  with  getting  rid  of  them  if 
they  were  too  obvious,  we  see  how  impossible  it  is  to 


128       The  Life  attd  Teachings  of  fesus. 

make  the  acceptance  of  a  book  like  the  Fourth  Gospel 
appear  incomprehensible.  The  very  audacity  of  the 
book,  the  audacity  of  a  work  of  genius,  and  the  har- 
mony in  which  it  stood  with  the  best  tendencies  of  the 
age,  which  it  carried  out  and  completed,  would  make 
it  successful  where  a  lesser  book  might  have  failed. 

But  still  we  have  the  question  to  answer,  who  after 
all  was  the  author  of  the  book,  if  the  author  was  not 
John  ?  is  it  not  indeed  possible  at  least  to  give  some 
share  of  the  book  to  the  Apostle,  to  carry  it  back  to 
him  at  any  rate  in  part  ?  This  is  what  Mr.  Arnold  has 
tried  to  do,  and  he  has  found  in  the  book  traces  of  the 
hand  of  one  of  John's  disciples,  who  had  put  together 
after  his  own  fashion  what  he  had  heard  from  his 
master,  and  had  published  it  with  the  approval  of  the 
church  at  Ephesus ;  upon  the  Tubingen  professors, 
who  have  discovered  in  the  book  a  profound  art,  Mr. 
Arnold  is  very  severe.  But  such  a  theory  as  this, 
apart  from  the  criticism  upon  the  vigorous  and  rig- 
orous German  theories,  has  too  many  serious  difficul- 
ties in  its  wa}^  which  Mr.  Arnold  has  passed  somewhat 
lightly  over ;  for  one  thing  it  does  not  tell  us  where 
the  greater  part  of  the  matter  came  from.  The  whole 
conception  of  Jesus  which  dominates  the  Gospel,  the 
whole  historical  framework,  the  composition  of  the 
speeches  outside  of  isolated  logia,  long  narratives  which 
contain  miracles  or  which  for  other  reasons  we  find  it 
difficult  to  accept, — all  this,  on  Mr.  Arnold's  theory,  we 
must  give  to  the  author  and  not  to  the  Apostle.  Mr. 
Arnold  seems  indeed  not  wholly  to  have  overlooked 
the  difficulty,  but  the  way  in  which  he  gets  rid  of  it 
one  might  wish  had  been  a  little  clearer.  He  does  say, 
it  is  true,  that  the  narrative  ' '  might  well  be  thought, 
not  indeed  invented,  but  a  matter  of  infinitely  little 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  129 

care  and  attention  to  the  writer, ' '  but  this  is  so  vague 
an  answer  that  we  hardly  can  accept  it  as  an  answer  at 
all.  What  Mr.  Arnold  means  we  perhaps  may  guess 
from  the  way  in  which  he  explains  Bethany  beyond 
Jordan.  "The  author's  Palestinian  geography  was 
so  vague, ' '  he  says,  ' '  that  when  he  wants  a  name  for 
a  locality  he  takes  the  first  village  that  comes  into 
his  remembrance,  without  troubling  himself  to  think 
whether  it  suits  or  no," — a  way  of  going  to  work 
which  it  is  not  altogether  easy  for  a  plain  reader  to 
distinguish  from  invention.  And  as  for  the  narrative 
being  a  matter  of  infinitely  little  care  to  the  writer, 
surely  here  Mr.  Arnold  is  mistaken.  For  when  a 
writer  devotes  fully  half  his  book  to  narrative,  when 
he  is  all  the  time  giving  notices  of  time  and  place, 
and  when  he  closes  with  an  account  of  the  Pas- 
sion which  is  fuller  than  that  which  the  older  tradi- 
tion has  given,  this  cannot  be  all  a  matter  of  infinitely 
little  care  to  him.  And  to  suppose,  as  Mr.  Arnold 
supposes,  that  the  Elders  of  Ephesus  should  have 
added  their  testimony  that  it  was  the  Apostle  who  had 
"written  these  things,"  is,  even  upon  Mr.  Arnold's 
own  showing,  somewhat  absurd. 

But  what  must  decide  the  question  for  us  is  the  fact 
that  whoever  the  author  may  be,  he  certainly  intends  to 
speak  in  the  person  of  the  Apostle  John.  It  is  true 
indeed  that  this  fact  has  been  disputed,  and  so  we  shall 
have  to  examine  it  somewhat  more  closely.  As  we 
read  the  book,  we  every  now  and  then  find  ourselves 
meeting  with  a  certain  disciple  who,  it  is  clear,  stands 
in  some  peculiar  relation  to  the  work.  He  is  spoken 
of  for  the  most  part  as  the  disciple  whom  Jesus  loved, 
and  he  is  never  named  any  more  definitely  than  this. 
This  disciple  leans  on  Jesus'  breast  at  supper,  and  asks 


1 30       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

the  name  of  the  traitor  ;  he  admits  Peter  to  the  palace 
of  the  high-priest ;  he  stands  by  the  cross  and  receives 
Jesus'  dying  message  ;  he  runs  with  Peter  to  the  empty 
tomb.  He  clearly  is  the  unnamed  disciple  of  the  Baptist 
who  hears  him  speak  and  follows  Jesus.  And  as  the 
narrative  has  just  left  him  at  the  cross,  without  doubt 
it  is  to  him  that  appeal  is  made  as  a  witness  to  the 
flowing  of  blood  and  water  from  Jesus'  side  :  ' '  He 
that  hath  seen  hath  borne  witness,  and  his  witness  is 
true,  and  he  knoweth  that  he  saith  true,  that  ye  also 
may  believe. ' '  Who  then  are  we  to  understand  that  the 
disciple  is  ?  Naturally  we  should  look  for  him  among 
the  three  disciples  who  were  most  intimate  with  Jesus. 
Now  Peter  is  repeatedly  mentioned  along  with  him, 
and  James  was  early  put  to  death,  so  that  we  have 
only  John  who  is  left.  And  as  John  is  never  named 
in  the  Gospel,  and  it  is  not  likely  that  he  would  have 
been  passed  over  without  being  spoken  of  at  all,  we 
can  hardly  refuse  to  see  him  in  the  disciple  whom 
Jesus  loved.  John,  then,  is  the  beloved  disciple,  and 
from  the  way  in  which  he  is  mentioned  we  are  com- 
pelled to  draw  the  inference  that  he  stands  in  some 
peculiar  relation  to  the  work,  either  that  he  is  the  au- 
thor who  is  referring  to  himself  in  this  indirect  way, 
or  that  he  is  the  source  of  the  statements  which  the 
author  makes.  Now  which  are  we  to  suppose  that  he 
really  is,  the  author,  or  the  source  of  the  author's 
knowledge  ? 

Dr.  Cone,  in  his  chapter  on  the  Fourth  Gospel,  has 
no  doubt  that  he  is  the  source  of  the  author's  knowl- 
edge, and  that  the  language  plainly  shows  that  this  is 
so.  "For,"  he  says,  "certainly  the  only  natural 
explanation  of  the  passage" — he  is  speaking  of  the 
passage  which  has  already  been  quoted, —  ' '  certainly 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  131 

the  only  natural  explanation  of  the  passage  is  that  the 
author  refers  in  it  to  one  who  has  already  borne  testi- 
mony which  he  uses  and  wishes  to  assure  the  reader 
to  be  trustworthy.  An  author  writing  of  himself  could 
neither  say  'that  one,'  nor  'hath  borne  witness.'" 
Could  not  say  it  ?  Well,  we  turn  to  the  ninth  chapter 
of  the  Gospel  and  we  find  that  our  author  has  put  these 
words  into  Jesus'  mouth  :  "  Thou  hast  both  seen  him, 
and  that  one  it  is  {eusivo'C)  who  speaketh  with  thee.'" 
Then  let  us  turn  to  the  first  chapter,  to  the  thirty- 
fourth  verse,  and  there  again  we  shall  find  these  words  : 
' '  I  have  seen  and  have  borne  witness  that  this  is  the 
Son  of  God."  It  is  the  Baptist  who  is  speaking,  and 
the  witness  he  refers  to  is  that  which  he  is  just  then 
bearing,  a  case  which  we  see  is  perfectly  parallel  to 
our  passage.  So  that  it  is  not  impossible  after  all  ; 
and  indeed  if  the  author  is  all  the  while  speaking  in 
the  third  person,  as  certainly  he  has  a  right  to  do  if  he 
chooses,  it  is  the  very  thing  that  we  should  expect. 
And  on  the  other  side,  if  the  author  is  referring  to 
another  person,  what  can  be  the  meaning  of  that  clause 
"he  knoweth  that  he  saith  true  "  ?  The  Apostle  is 
dead  now,  we  remember  ;  and  how  indeed  could  any 
one  appeal  at  all  to  another  person's  consciousness  of 
truth?  to  his  truth,  perhaps,  but  not  to  his  conscious- 
ness of  truth.  And  then,  too,  the  very  indefinite  allu- 
sion, "he  who  hath  seen,"  and  the  fact  that  the  writer 
never  names  this  authority  of  his,  how  are  we  to 
explain  this  ?  A  person  who  is  writing  of  himself  it 
suits  well  enough,  but  it  does  not  suit  at  all  the  tone 
of  a  disciple  who  is  speaking  of  his  master  and  of  the 
source  from  which  he  gets  his  facts.  Such  a  reserve  is 
quite  out  of  place ;  rather  should  we  expect  him  to  tell 
us  very  plainly  of  it,   and  to  make  much  of  the  fact 


132        TJie  Life  and  Teachings  of  fesus. 

that  he  has  no  less  authority  than  that  of  John  behind 
him. 

And  that  we  have  found  the  true  explanation  is 
shown  very  distinctly  in  the  last  chapter,  where  a  cer- 
tain person  or  persons  distinguish  themselves  from  the 
disciple  whom  Jesus  loved,  and  name  him  as  the 
author  of  the  book.  Now  this  certainly  appears  to 
make  a  distinction  between  the  last  chapter  and  the 
rest  of  the  book,  and  such  a  distinction  we  think  is 
quite  unquestionable.  At  the  end  of  chapter  twenty 
the  book  evidently  comes  to  a  close,  and  while  before 
this  every  thing  has  apparently  been  written  in  the 
character  of  an  eye-witness,  in  the  appendix  this  is 
suddenly  dropped.  Besides  the  verse  which  expressly 
distinguishes  the  writer  from  the  disciple  who  wrote 
the  rest  of  the  book,  we  find  such  an  expression  as 
"  the  sons  of  Zebedee,"  and  in  the  twentieth  verse  we 
have  a  reference  to  the  beloved  disciple  which  is  so 
clearly  objective  that  we  can  hardly  think  it  is  meant 
to  be  understood  as  coming  from  a  writer  who  is  speak- 
ing of  himself.  So  that  very  many  critics  have  come 
to  the  conclusion  that  the  last  chapter  was  written  by 
another  person.  Their  confidence,  however,  we  do  not 
find  ourselves  able  to  share.  The  book  never  appears 
without  this  last  chapter,  so  that  at  least  it  must  have 
been  added  ver>^  early  ;  and  in  style  the  chapter  agrees 
with  the  rest  of  the  Gospel  in  a  very  minute  waj'.  We 
think  that  the  critics  have  been  too  ready  to  suppose 
the  existence  of  a  writer  who  could  imitate  at  once  the 
conceptions  and  the  style  of  the  Gospel  so  cleverly, 
especially  as  his  object  in  doing  this  is  by  no  means 
clear.  So  that  we  think  it  much  more  probable  that 
we  have  to  do  with  the  same  writer  who,  after  speaking 
throughout  the  book  in  the  character  of  the  disciple, 


The  FouiHk  Gospel.  133 

now  drops  the  character  which  he  has  assumed,  and 
speaks  for  himself.  And  the  reason  for  his  doing  this, 
if  what  we  have  discovered  about  the  Gospel  be  true,  is 
not  far  to  seek.  Just  who  the  author  was  it  is  not  likely 
that  we  shall  ever  know.  We  think  it  is  probable  that 
the  three  Epistles  were  written  by  him,  the  first  Epistle 
certainly,  and,  as  it  seems,  the  other  Epistles  also,  for 
as  forgeries  we  do  not  see  just  what  object  they  could 
have  attained.  In  this  case  then,  the  author  probably 
was  a  presbyter  in  one  of  the  cities  of  Asia  Minor,  but 
at  any  rate  he  was  a  man  who  had  reached  a  new 
conception  of  Christianity,  a  philosophy  of  religion, 
which,  as  Jesus  stood  at  the  centre  of  it,  he  wished  to 
carry  out  in  a  representation  of  Jesus'  life  ;  and  in  ac- 
cordance with  a  very  common  literary  custom  he  deter- 
mined that  it  should  be  written  in  the  person  of  one 
who  actually  had  lived  in  Jesus'  time,  and  who  should 
stand  for  the  religious  conception  which  he  had  to 
represent.  It  was  natural  that  he  should  choose  one 
of  the  three  disciples  who  were  especially  close  to  Jesus  ; 
but  James  had  early  been  put  to  death,  and  Peter  had 
come  to  stand  so  definitely  for  Judaic  Christianity,  the 
Gospel  of  the  Circumcision,  that  he  could  not  very  well 
be  made  to  represent  a  Gospel  which  was  purely  spirit- 
ual and  universal.  So  that  John  alone  was  left,  and 
him  the  author  chose.  But  while  John  certainly  is 
meant  by  the  beloved  disciple,  yet  it  is  true  also  that 
he  appears  rather  as  an  ideal  figure,  as  a  representation 
of  the  spiritual  Christianity  of  the  Gospel,  than  as  the 
actual,  the  personal  John.  It  is  only  in  this  way  that 
we  can  explain  wh)^  his  personal  name  never  is  applied 
to  him,  and  why  Jesus'  especial  love  for  him  is  so  often 
insisted  on.  And  this  also  explains  the  very  peculiar 
relation  in  which  John  stands  to   Peter — Peter,  who 


134       T^^^^  ^{/^  ^^^^  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

represented  Judaic  Christianity.  In  the  early  Gos- 
pels it  is  Peter  who  without  question  stands  first  among 
the  disciples,  but  in  the  Fourth  Gospel  this  is  com- 
pletely reversed,  and  reversed  in  such  a  significant  way 
that  we  scarcely  can  refuse  to  see  it.  It  is  John,  not 
Peter,  who  is  called  first ;  he  leans  on  Jesus'  breast  at 
supper  and  acts  as  a  mediator  between  Peter  and  the 
Lord  ;  at  the  betrayal  he  follows  Jesus  boldly  where 
Peter  follows  with  trembling,  and  it  is  through  him 
that  Peter  enters  the  palace.  He  alone  stands  by  the 
cross  and  receives  the  Lord's  mother  into  his  charge; 
he  outruns  Peter  in  coming  to  the  tomb.  Now  as  his- 
tory this  is  all  very  doubtful,  for  to  take  only  the  part 
which  John  plays  at  the  crucifixion,  the  older  accounts 
make  it  clear  that  the  disciples  forsook  Jesus  at  the 
betrayal,  and  that  only  Peter  ventured  to  follow  timidly 
at  a  distance.  But  here  John,  to  say  nothing  of  the 
difiiculty  of  his  being  known  to  the  high-priest,  appears 
with  no  trace  of  fear,  and  apparently  is  present 
throughout  the  whole  proceedings.  The  older  Gospels 
again  exclude  the  presence  of  any  of  the  diciples  at 
the  cross,  and  only  speak  of  a  few  women  afar  oflf ;  but 
here  John  remains  at  the  very  foot  of  the  cross  till  the 
end  comes,  a  thing  which  we  must  think  is  quite  im- 
possible. In  all  this  there  is  no  hostility  to  Peter,  but 
still  he  must  ever}' where  be  second,  he  must,  so  we 
cannot  help  thinking,  give  place  to  the  purer  Chris- 
tianity which  John  represents.  And  the  appendix  in 
our  view  is  no  after-thought,  but  the  author's  state- 
ment of  this,  it  is  the  carrying  out  of  the  allegory 
which  appears  throughout  the  book.  To  Peter  the 
Lord  restores  his  favor,  he  entrusts  him  with  the  care 
of  his  sheep  ;  but  then  he  predicts  to  him  his  death. 
And    Peter,    turning   to    the    beloved   disciple,   asks, 


The  Fourth  Gospel.  135 

"I,ord,  and  what  shall  this  man  do?"  And  Jesus 
answers  :  "  If  I  will  that  he  tarry  till  I  come,  what  is 
that  to  thee  ?  follow  thou  me. ' '  Jewish  Christianity, 
material  and  partial,  has  its  work  to  do,  but  it  is  to  pass 
away  ;  the  higher,  the  spiritual  Christianity  is  to  en- 
dure till  Christ  himself  shall  come.  Does  any  one  think 
that  this  is  forced,  that  it  is  a  play  of  fancy?  But  we 
have  failed  entirely  if  we  have  not  shown  that  through- 
out the  book  there  is  much  which  has  no  explanation 
unless  it  is  explained  in  just  such  a  way  as  this.  And 
right  at  this  crowning  point  the  author  gives  us  a  hint 
of  his  purpose  :  "  Yet  Jesus  said  not  unto  him,  '  He 
shall  not  die,'  but,  '  If  I  will  that  he  tarry  till  I 
come,  what  is  that  to  thee  ?  '  " ;  what  does  this  mean  if 
it  is  not  to  warn  the  reader  that  there  is  something 
behind  the  natural  meaning  of  the  words,  something 
which  will  give  him  the  key  for  understanding  them  ? 
Such  allegory  may  seem  strange  to  us  now,  but  it  was 
not  strange  to  men  of  the  second  century,  and  certainly 
it  was  not  strange  to  a  writer  who,  sending  a  friendly 
letter  to  a  neighboring  church,  addresses  the  church  as 
"  Lady,"  and  keeps  up  the  figure  to  the  end. 

This  then  we  must  recognize  if  we  are  to  understand 
the  book  :  that  the  history,  the  facts,  are  not  facts  at  all, 
but  only  an  outward  dress,  a  picture  of  the  ideas  which 
the  author  wishes  us  to  see  beneath  them.  The  author 
does  not  mean  them  to  be  accepted  as  facts,  and  the 
very  boldness  of  his  attempt  shows  his  ingenuousness  ; 
a  man  who  had  gone  to  work  cunningly  with  an  inten- 
tion to  deceive,  would  have  kept  much  more  closely 
to  the  ordinary  tradition,  for  it  would  have  occurred  to 
him  that  he  must  not  depart  too  far  from  the  regular  road, 
that  he  must  make  his  work  not  too  difficult  to  accept. 
To  call  the  book  a  forgery  is  to  lose  all  sight  of  the 


136       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

different  point  of  view  from  which  men  once  looked  at 
the  matter,  and  to  forget  that  it  was  then  a  perfectly- 
legitimate  device  ;  in  reality  it  corresponds  more  nearly 
to  a  modern  work  of  fiction.  At  this  very  period  we 
have  traces  of  a  number  of  books  in  which,  under  the 
name  of  some  famous  man,  often  under  the  name  of  an 
Apostle,  an  author  presented  his  opinions,  and  which  no 
one  would  think  of  calling  dishonest ;  and  of  these  our 
Gospel  is  only  one.  But  among  these  it  stands  alone 
as  a  work  of  the  highest  genius.  As  history  it  has 
no  value,  but  as  the  highest  expression  of  religious 
philosophy  which  Christianity  produced,  it  will  always 
remain,  as  Luther  called  it,  "  the  only  tender,  true 
chief- Gospel."  The  form  in  which  its  philosophy  is 
expressed  we  ma)^  sometimes  have  to  discard,  but 
the  substance  remains  untouched.  The  thought  of 
Jesus  as  a  revelation  of  God  in  man,  the  absolute  free- 
dom of  worship,  the  dominion  of  truth,  eternal  life  as 
something  which  is  essentially  spiritual,  a  present  pos- 
session which  consists  in  perfect  communion  with  God, 
— this  and  more  besides  has  become  our  permanent 
inheritance,  and  to  the  Fourth  Gospel  we  owe  it  most 
of  all. 


CHAPTER  III. 


THi;   CREDIBILITY   OF    THE   GOSPEI^S. 


BEFORE  entering  upon  any  positive  sketch  of  Jesus' 
life  and  teaching,  it  will  simplif}'  the  problem 
materially  if  we  can  come  in  some  approximate 
degree  at  an  estimate  of  the  amount  of  historical  credi- 
bility which  is  to  be  assigned  to  the  Gospel  narratives, 
and  so  can  get  some  standard  which  maj-  be  applied  to 
the  more  doubtful  cases.  It  may  be  said  that  this  is 
precisely  the  object  of  the  whole  investigation,  and  can 
only  come  as  a  result  at  the  end,  after  all  the  facts  have 
been  examined  ;  and  up  to  a  certain  extent  this  is  true. 
But  against  such  a  method,  if  followed  out  strictly, 
there  is  this  objection,  that  the  reader  quickly  gets 
involved  in  a  tangle  of  conflicting  probabilities  and 
provisional  results,  and  becomes  so  bewildered  in  try- 
ing to  extricate  himself  that  he  loses  sight  of  his  path, 
and  has  at  the  end  only  a  confused  notion  of  the  ground 
over  which  he  has  been  travelling.  It  ought  to  be 
possible,  by  selecting  out  the  cases  which  are  the  clear- 
est, to  obtain  an  answer  to  the  question  in  a  general 
way,  and  so  to  clear  up  in  some  measure  the  road  to  a 
positive  reconstruction.  Moreover,  in  the  present  case 
this  becomes  a  necessity  in  view  of  the  fact  that  we 
have  the  question  of  miracles  to  settle,  and  this  is  a 

137 


138       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

question  of  so  peculiar  a  nature  that  it  can  best  be 
disposed  of  by  itself.  We  shall  therefore  first  discuss 
the  question  of  the  miraculous,  in  its  bearing  upon  the 
historicity  of  the  Gospels,  and  then  shall  try  to  find 
some  general  criterion  as  to  the  trustworthiness  of 
each  individual  book  which  has  come  down  to  us. 

In  starting  once  again  on  the  question  of  miracles, 
one  cannot  help  a  disheartened  feeling  that  probably 
nothing  which  he  shall  say  will  have  the  least  effect 
upon  those  who  do  not  already  agree  with  him. 
Nevertheless,  some  of  the  unsatisfactoriness  which  is  in- 
cident to  such  discussions  may  perhaps  be  eliminated  by 
defining  carefully  the  grounds  on  which  it  is  proposed  to 
argue.  In  the  present  case  these  will  be  historical 
grounds  simply,  and  all  purely  philosophical  consider- 
ations, just  so  far  as  one  can  help  making  use  of  those 
principles  which  lie  at  the  bottom  of  his  mental  make- 
up, and  form  the  medium  which  inevitably  tinges  his 
view  of  things,  will  be  ruled  out.  This  is  not  saying 
that  philosophical  arguments  deserve  to  have  no  weight, 
for  it  is  not  reasonable  to  ask  a  man  to  accept,  without 
special  evidence,  that  which  goes  flat  against  the  best 
conceptions  he  has  been  able  to  form  of  the  universe. 
But  if  such  arguments  are  to  have  any  practical  effect 
in  convincing  others,  one  will  first  have  to  prove  that 
his  philosophy  is  right,  and  that  in  itself  is  liable  to  be 
a  matter  of  difficulty.  And  besides  there  is  some  justi- 
fication for  the  distrust  with  which  in  general  purely 
philosophical  considerations  are  apt  to  be  viewed,  for 
after  all  the  universe  is  a  ver}^  vast  and  a  very  complex 
thing,  and  when  the  philosopher  undertakes  to  prove 
that  this  or  that  event  cannot  occur,  the  possibility 
that  there  is  something  which  he  has  failed  to  take 
into  his  account  is  so  great,  that  no  one,  except  per- 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  139 


haps  the  philosopher  himself,  is  quite  ready  to  look 
upon  the  matter  as  settled.  We  therefore  shall  con- 
sider that  we  are  spared  in  our  character  as  historian 
the  somewhat  tedious  task  of  trying  to  show  that  a 
miracle  is  an  impossibility  or  a  philosophical  absurdity, 
and  shall  make  no  assumption  whatever  about  the 
matter.  And  this  may  be  supposed  to  give  us  the 
privilege  of  passing  by  as  well  those  arguments  on 
the  other  side,  which  have  attempted  to  show  that  a 
miraculous  revelation  is  just  the  sort  of  thing  we  ought 
to  look  for.  The  two  may  be  considered  to  balance 
each  other. 

But  in  refusing  to  assert  that  miracles  are  impossible, 
it  is  not  of  course  intended  to  say  that  they  have  lost 
any  of  their  inherent  improbability,  though  many  seem 
to  imagine  that  this  step  is  an  easy  one,  and  to  con- 
sider that  after  they  have  shown  that  the  possibility 
of  a  miracle  is  not  absolutely  excluded,  the  bulk  of 
their  work  has  been  done.  But  this  shows  an  entire 
failure  to  appreciate  the  nature  of  the  problem.  The 
strength  of  the  case  against  miracles  lies  first  of  all 
in  the  historical  argument  against  them,  and  this 
must  have  a  preponderant  influence.  Now  as  a  matter 
of  fact,  leaving  out  this  single  period  which  is  in  dis- 
pute,— for  the  Old  Testament  miracles  are  the  weakest 
of  broken  reeds,  and  can  only  be  bolstered  up  by  the 
very  strongest  evidence  from  the  New, — we  know  that 
events  in  nature  have  come  about  according  to  definite 
and  unvarying  laws,  and  that  miracles  have  not  hap- 
pened. But — and  this  is  the  real  point  of  the  matter — 
vi\\rz.Q\s.- stories  are  the  commonest  things  in  the  world, 
and  have  sprung  up  in  the  greatest  profusion  in  every 
age,  not  excluding  the  present  one.  There  is  therefore 
against  the  miracle-stories  which   are  recorded  in  the 


140       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  yesus. 

Gospels  the  overwhelming  presumption  which  is  af- 
forded by  these  two  facts,  that  events  of  such  a  nature 
as  those  which  the  Gospels  relate  are  absolutely  un- 
known, whereas  the  collections  of  miracle-stories  which 
exist  are  indefinite  in  number,  and  in  every  other  case 
they  are  demonstrated  to  be  baseless.  Accordingly, 
there  is  an  immense  presumption  that  in  this  case,  too, 
the  phenomena  are  not  to  be  explained  in  some  new 
and  strange  way,  but  just  as  the  same  phenomena  have 
been  explained  before.  It  is  not  necessary  to  say  with 
Hume  that  this  presumption  is  absolutely  conclusive. 
Suppose  that  miracles  actually  have  happened,  and 
there  is  nothing  in  it  to  render  impossible  a  proof  of 
their  occurrence  which  to  all  practical  intents  shall  be 
a  satisfactory  one.  If  it  could  be  shown  conclusively 
that  the  writings  which  described  these  miracles  came 
from  the  hand  of  eye-witnesses,  or  else  from  their  im- 
mediate hearers,  if  the  good  faith  of  all  the  parties 
concerned  could  be  made  morally  certain,  if  the  mir- 
acles were  of  such  a  character  that  they  could  not  be 
attributed  without  the  greatest  forcing  to  a  blunder  or 
mistake,  and  if  there  was  nothing  in  the  rest  of  the 
history  or  the  literature  of  that  time  to  contradict  or 
throw  doubt  upon  their  testimony — all  of  which  is  con- 
ceivable enough, — it  hardly  would  be  fair  to  make  any 
further  demands.  To  put  the  case  more  concretely,  if 
our  four  Gospels  could  be  shown  to  have  proceeded  from 
the  men  whose  names  they  bear,  with  as  much  probabil- 
ity as  it  can  be  shown  that  the  Epistle  to  the  Romans 
comes  from  Paul,  there  would  be  little  more  to  say. 
But  again  it  must  be  insisted  that  such  a  hypothetical 
case  destroys  none  of  the  antecedent  improbability 
of  miracles,  and  that  they  are  to  be  treated  with  the 
utmost  rigor  and  suspicion.     And  in  this  respect  the 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  141 

Gospel  miracles  do  not  have  the  slightest  advantage 
over  their  fellows.  Such  a  claim  is  sometimes  made 
for  them,  based  chiefly  upon  the  unique  character 
and  personality  of  Jesus,  and  to  this  extent  it  may  be 
conceded  that  the  claim  has  an  element  of  truth  in  it, 
that  if  on  independent  grounds  the  truth  of  the  mir- 
acles can  be  sustained,  then  the  uniqueness  of  Jesus 
will  go  a  little  way  to  make  them  more  conceivable. 
But  in  so  far  as  it  is  intended  by  this  to  weaken  the 
antecedent  suspicion  with  which  miracles  are  to  be  re- 
garded, and  to  deprecate  the  most  searching  criticism 
of  them,  the  plea  is  entirely  without  force.  The 
uniqueness  of  Jesus  does  not  make  it  unlikely  that 
miracle-stories  should  have  grown  up  about  him,  nor 
does  it  make  it  probable  that  he  will  really  work  mir- 
acles himself,  simply  because  spiritual  greatness  has 
no  sort  of  connection  with  miracles  at  all.  One  might 
argue  much  more  forcibly  on  the  other  side  that 
miracles,  which  in  every  other  case  are  a  proof  of  super- 
stition and  of  error,  are  the  very  last  things  by  which 
we  ^hould  expect  Jesus  to  attest  his  greatness  and  his 
truth.  What  the  defenders  of  the  miracles  are  called 
upon  to  prove  is,  not  that  they  are  connected  with  the 
person  of  Jesus,  but  that  in  themselves  they  are  quite 
different  from  other  miracles  ;  and  as  this  is  just  the 
question  at  issue,  it  can  have  no  influence  with  us  at  the 
start.  It  is  true  that  upon  the  whole  the  Gospel  miracles 
are  more  sober  than  those  of  other  great  cycles  of  miracle- 
stories  ;  but  that  is  not  a  matter  of  any  special  moment. 
Nor  do  vague  impressions  of  the  truthfulness  and 
historical  character  of  the  narratives  count  for  any- 
thing, for  of  course  those  things  will  have  the  flavor 
of  reality  to  us  which  we  have  always  been  accustomed 
to  believe  were  true.     What  we  are  bound  to  do  is 


142        The  Life  and  Teaclii7igs  of  Jesus. 

to  rid  ourselves  as  much  as  possible  of  the  glamour 
which  the  sacredness  of  the  story  has  cast  about  it,  and 
then  subject  the  story  to  precisely  the  same  tests 
which  we  are  accustomed  to  use  elsewhere.  If  the 
story  will  not  stand  these  tests,  with  what  face  can  we 
blame  people  if  they  do  not  accept  the  story  as  true. 
The  great  fault  of  Christian  Apologists  lies  just  here, 
that  they  have  been  too  indulgent  to  the  Gospels,  that 
they  have  refused  to  treat  them  rigorously,  and  they 
practically  have  asked  us  to  approach  the  miraculous  as 
a  perfectly  open  question,  to  be  decided  upon  the  same 
degree  of  evidence  which  would  satisfj^  us  in  the  case 
of  a  natural  event.  But  of  course  this  cannot  be  ad- 
mitted for  a  moment.  To  be  sure  we  come  to  the 
miracles  with  a  prejudice  against  them,  and  anyone 
who  comes  in  a  different  waj^  is  totally  unfit  to  reason 
on  the  question.  Accordingly,  we  shall  assume  they 
are  not  true  till  we  find  the  very  strongest  evidence  for 
changing  our  opinion  ;  we  shall  search  for  errors  and 
contradictions  ;  between  two  divergent  accounts,  the 
one  which  has  least  of  the  miraculous  in  it  will  be 
unhesitatingly  preferred  if  other  things  are  equal  ;  the 
ability  to  show  how  a  miracle  might  have  arisen  will 
be  considered  as  sufiicient  proof  against  it.  Instead  of 
confining  ourselves  to  the  cases  for  which  the  most  can 
be  said,  and  slurring  over  those  which  are  most  sus- 
picious, and  bear  more  clearly  the  marks  of  legend, 
we  shall  consider  that  the  latter  are  particularly  sig- 
nificant in  their  bearing,  and  that  instead  of  being 
buoyed  up  by  the  others  they  tend  to  drag  the  others 
down  with  them.  Hypotheses  for  harmonizing  the 
discrepancies  which  occur  in  parallel  accounts  we 
shall  not  regard  as  needing  refutation,  because  the 
problem  is  not  to  show  that  the  different  versions  may 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  143 

be  reconciled,  but  that  the  presumption  against  the  story 
itself  can  be  removed,  and  its  falsity  shown  to  be  out 
of  the  question.  We  shall  not  deem  it  necessary  to 
accoimt  definitely  for  each  individual  miracle,  or  to 
point  out  just  the  logical  process  by  which  each  detail 
arose,  because  logic  is  the  last  thing  to  be  expected, 
and  because  it  is  the  very  nature  of  the  growth  of 
miracle-stories  to  be  irresponsible  and  incalculable. 
This  is  simply  what  we  do  in  other  cases.  There  are 
many  other  miracles  for  which  the  external  evidence 
is  strong  to  a  surprising  degree,  and  yet  we  do  not 
hesitate  in  the  least  to  set  conjecture  over  against  the 
clearest  testimony,  and  to  reject  the  testimony  at  once. 
It  is  just  in  this  that  a  miracle  differs  from  a  natural 
event ;  we  do  not  balance  the  evidence,  but  so  long  as 
there  is  a  possibility  that  a  mistake  has  been  made,  we 
accept  that  possibility  as  established.  If  any  one 
objects  to  this  way  of  proceeding,  we  really  do  not 
know  what  to  say  to  him.  He  is  asking  us  to  slay 
the  miracles  after  taking  every  weapon  out  of  our 
hands. 

Now  to  begin  with,  the  existence  of  miracle-stories 
in  the  early  Christian  communities  does  not  furnish 
the  least  difficulty,  but  it  would  have  been  a  most 
surprising  thing  if  legend  had  not  been  actively 
at  work.  Every  condition  was  present  in  an  unusual 
degree,  ignorance,  an  unwavering  belief  in  the  possi- 
bility of  the  miraculous,  an  intense  religious  excite- 
ment ;  and  at  other  times  these  conditions  have  given 
rise  to  just  the  sort  of  phenomena  which  we  find  in  the 
age  of  the  Apostles.  And  right  here  one  great  objec- 
tion to  the  miracles  lies.  If  it  were  only  in  the  life  of 
Jesus  that  we  found  them,  then  we  could  at  least  see 
some  principle  to  account  for  them  ;  but  when  we  find 


1 44       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  festis. 

that  the  Apostles  too  worked  miracles,  and  that  many  of 
the  otlier  Christians  were  credited  with  the  same  power, 
when  we  see  the  miraculous  stretched  out  through 
several  centuries,  and  only  d5-ing  gradually  away,  do 
we  not  see  that  this  has  all  the  marks  of  a  natural 
phenomenon  and  not  of  a  divine  revelation  ?  There  is 
the  case  of  the  Apostle  Paul,  the  clearest  and  the  most 
unequivocal  of  any  in  the  New  Testament  ;  Paul  be- 
lieves that  the  men  about  him  have  the  power  of  work- 
ing miracles,  and  he  believes  that  he,  himself,  has 
worked  them, — could  there  be  any  more  definite  testi- 
mony than  this?  But  St.  Bernard  also  believed  that 
he  had  worked  miracles,  and  it  surely  cannot  satisfy 
us  to  say  that  Bernard  must  have  been  mistaken,  and 
that  Paul  must  have  been  right.  It  is  just  for  this 
that  there  is  no  proof  whatever.  Paul  had  no  better 
knowledge  than  his  age  had,  and  he  was  as  likely  as 
any  one  to  account  for  a  surprising  event,  of  which  he 
did  not  understand  the  cause,  as  a  work  of  divine 
power.  We  have  a  clear  evidence  of  this  in  a  case 
which  is  very  similar  to  the  case  of  miracles,  the 
so-called  gift  of  tongues.  There  can  hardly  be  any 
doubt  that  this  gift,  which  Paul  describes  in  his  letter 
to  the  Corinthians,  was  only  a  form  of  strong  religious 
excitement,  which  we  cannot  call  inspired  unless  we 
are  willing  to  give  the  same  name  to  the  similar  out- 
breaks among  modern  sects,  an  excitement,  moreover, 
that  was  capable  of  leading  to  great  abuses.  But 
Paul,  while  with  much  good  sense  he  rebukes  these 
excesses,  and  will  not  allow  that  the  gift  stands  very- 
high  in  the  scale,  yet  has  no  doubt  that  it  is  of  divine 
origin,  and  that  it  enables  the  disciple  "  in  the  spirit  to 
speak  mysteries." 

In  such  an  age,  therefore,  we  .should  look  for  miracle- 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  145 

stories,  even  if  we  had  to  do  with  actual  eye-witnesses  ; 
and  yet  in  this  case  the  chance  for  mistake  would  be 
very  much  lessened,  and  we  should  expect  to  be  able, 
with  some  probability,  to  sift  out  what  actually  had 
happened.  But  Paul,  who  speaks  of  his  own  miracles, 
fails  to  give  us  any  concrete  instance  of  them,  while 
the  writers  on  whom  we  must  depend  for  our  examples, 
not  only  cannot  be  proved  to  have  been  eye-witnesses, 
but  most  probably  had  some  of  them  never  seen  an  eye- 
witness ;  so  that  the  chances  for  error  become  almost 
infinite.  To  make  one  who  does  not  wish  it  see  that 
in  the  Gospels  there  are  clear  traces  of  legend,  which 
we  can  even  watch  in  its  growth,  we  fear  is  hardly  pos- 
sible, for  we  know  how  strong  a  hold  the  Gospel  narra- 
tives have  over  men  ;  but  we  think  that  without  any 
doubt  the  evidence  is  there.  Not  to  start  in  with  the 
Gospels  themselves,  there  is  a  very  good  example  con- 
nected with  the  phenomenon  which  has  just  been 
mentioned,  the  gift  of  tongues.  The  author  of  the 
Acts  has  at  the  beginning  of  his  book  an  incident 
which  took  place  on  the  day  of  Pentecost,  and  there 
can  be  no  reasonable  doubt  that  the  phenomenon  is  the 
same  as  that  which  is  described  by  Paul.  But  how 
does  the  author  understand  it  ?  Why,  he  thinks  that 
it  is  nothing  else  than  a  speaking  in  foreign  languages  ; 
he  makes  a  miracle  out  of  what  we  have  the  clearest 
proof  was  something  very  different.  Commentators 
have  tried  in  the  most  artificial  of  ways  to  avoid  this 
conclusion,  and  we  believe  have  charged  it  to  the  arbi- 
trariness of  rationalistic  criticism  ;  but  this  always  has 
been  upon  the  assumption  that  the  account  is  thor- 
oughly reliable,  and  that  a  mistake  is  the  last  thing 
to  be  admitted.  If  we  once  will  admit  that  a  miracle 
in  itself  is  suspicious,  we  shall  wonder  how  any  other 


146       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

explanation  could  ever  have  been  thought  of,  when  so 
simple  a  one  lay  at  hand.  Now  this  same  thing  can 
be  traced  in  the  Gospels  as  well,  a  tradition  which  is 
constantly  growing  more  and  more  legendary  by  a 
process  which  we  often  can  detect  taking  place  under 
our  ver>'  eyes.  It  is  no  accident  that  the  stories  which 
are  peculiar  to  Matthew,  the  stories  of  Jesus'  infancy, 
the  miracle  of  the  coin  in  the  fish's  mouth,  the  walking 
of  Peter  on  the  water,  and  the  resurrection  of  the  saints 
at  the  death  of  Jesus,  belong  to  the  latest  stratum  of 
the  Gospel  literature  ;  and  they  are  no  whit  harder  to 
account  for  than  a  host  of  legends  about  saints  and 
martyrs.  How  natural  it  would  be  to  collect  wonders 
about  as  stupendous  an  event  as  Jesus'  death  ;  how 
natural,  too,  still  to  keep  the  risen  saints  in  the  grave, 
that  they  should  not  anticipate  Jesus'  resurrection ! 
The  story  of  Peter's  walking  on  the  water,  a  trans- 
parent allegory  of  the  Apostle's  fickleness,  is  especially 
instructive,  for  not  only  by  its  connection  with  the 
walking  of  Jesus  on  the  sea  does  it  reveal  the  source 
from  which  its  form  was  derived,  but  we  also  have 
this  story  about  Jesus  in  an  earlier  Gospel,  which  evi- 
dently is  quite  ignorant  of  Peter's  experience.  And 
this  story,  too,  about  Jesus,  as  appears  from  the  way  in 
which  he  stills  the  tempest,  we  probably  can  trace  to 
a  simpler  story  which  was  present  in  a  still  earlier  Gos- 
pel, where  Jesus  is  only  represented  as  calming  the 
stonn. 

And  in  Luke's  Gospel  the  same  process  is  plainly 
visible.  A  comparison  of  Luke  with  Mark,  in  the  inci- 
dent of  the  high  priest's  servant,  will  give  an  illustra- 
tion of  the  way  in  which  the  determined  miracle- 
monger  can  make  use  of  the  merest  hint.  Tradition 
had  told  how  one  of  Jesus'  captors  had  lost  an  ear 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  147 

through  the  zeal  of  a  certain  disciple.  But  this  is  too 
good  an  opportunity  for  a  miracle  to  be  lost,  and  so  in 
Luke  we  find  that  the  ear  has  been  healed  by  a  touch 
from  Jesus'  hand.  How  arbitrary  the  favorite  device 
is  of  supposing  that  the  absence  of  an  incident  in  the 
earlier  accounts  is  simply  a  failure  to  tell  the  whole 
story  appears  in  this  case,  for  it  is  incredible,  if  a  mir- 
acle really  had  occurred,  that  the  earlier  narratives 
should  just  have  given  the  unimportant  introduction  to 
it,  and  have  omitted  the  miracle  itself,  for  which  the 
incident  would  be  remembered.  It  is  as  if  one  should 
recall  the  rising  of  the  curtain,  but  forget  that  the  play 
had  followed.  Jesus  had  the  power  to  heal  the  ear, — 
such  the  reasoning  seems  to  have  been, — and,  there- 
fore, the  ear  was  healed.  Similarly  in  the  stor}^  of  the 
Resurrection,  while  the  rest  of  the  accounts  are  con- 
tent to  say  that  the  stone  was  rolled  away,  Matthew 
knows  just  how  the  whole  thing  happened,  and  brings 
the  women  on  the  scene  to  witness  the  event.  Of 
course,  the  writers  imagine  that  they  are  giving  the 
real  facts  of  the  case,  and  the  freedom  of  their  con- 
jectures might  readily  be  paralleled  among  the  Rabbis 
or  the  Fathers,  or  among  modern  scholars  even  ;  but, 
nevertheless,  we  must  recognize  what  a  wide  field  it 
gives  for  error  and  mistake.  The  miraculous  draft  of 
fishes,  which  is  given  in  Luke,  is  another  case  in 
point ;  how  can  we  fail  to  see  on  what  a  slender 
thread  the  whole  thing  hangs,  when  we  find  that  there 
is  an  earlier  account  of  the  very  same  incident,  in 
which  the  miracle  is  not  so  much  as  hinted  at  ?  With 
a  miracle  to  start  with,  how  could  the  very  fact  of  its 
occurrence  have  dropped  out  of  sight,  when  the  inci- 
dent was  told  ?  And  in  a  similar  way,  in  the  account 
of  a  visit  to  Nazareth,  we  find  that  Luke  has  brought 


148        The  Life  and  Teachings  of  yesus. 

in  a  miraculous  escape  on  Jesus'    part   which    Mark 
knows  nothing  of. 

If  we  recognize  then  that  legend  has  been  at  work, 
we  see  how  irresistibly  it  will  burst  through  all  the 
limits  we  may  try  to  set  to  it,  and  how  difficult  it  will 
be  to  save  a  part  of  the  miraculous  at  the  expense 
of  the  rest.  As  we  said  before,  we  shall  not  undertake 
to  account  perfectly  for  ever>'  stor}-,  and  ver>^  likely 
there  are  some  wdiose  special  motive  it  is  no  longer 
possible  to  discover.  But  there  are  others  again  which 
can  be  explained  with  perfect  confidence.  The  rending 
of  the  Temple  vail,  for  example,  is  clearly  only  the 
materialization  of  a  doctrinal  truth,  a  metaphor  turned 
into  actual  fact ;  and  the  story  of  the  ten  lepers,  to  say 
nothing  of  the  unlikelihood  that  Jesus  should  have 
healed  men  like  this  in  batches,  is  little  more  than  an 
allegory  in  disguise.  These  examples  will  suggest  one 
set  of  influences  which  would  be  at  work  to  produce 
miracle-stories, — doctrinal  views,  that  is,  about  Jesus 
and  his  work,  and  especially  such  views  as  became  in 
later  5'ears  a  centre  of  controversy  ;  although  we  are 
not  disposed  to  give  a  very  prominent  place  to  this. 
Then  there  would  be  the  fruitful  influence  of  the  Old 
Testament,  which  Strauss  laid  so  much  stress  on,  and 
which  we  cannot  doubt  was  active  from  the  first. 
Among  men  to  whom  it  was  self-evident  that  the  Old 
Testament  was  filled  with  types  and  prophecies  of  the 
Messiah,  the  tendency  was  irresistible  to  find  these 
types  fulfilled  in  Jesus'  life,  and  to  them  an  Old  Testa- 
ment quotation  would  be  as  clear  a  proof  as  one  could 
wish  for.  One  evident  example  of  this  we  have  in  the 
account  of  Jesus'  entry  into  Jerusalem,  where  the  first 
Evangelist  has  two  animals  in  place  of  the  single  one 
of  the  older  account ;    and  the  proof  he  gives  for  his 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  1 49 

change  is  simply  a  passage  from  Isaiah,  "  Behold,  thy 
king  Cometh,  sitting  upon  an  ass,  and  a  colt,  the  foal 
of  an  ass. ' '  This  example  is  the  more  striking  because 
it  all  comes  from  a  mistaken  interpretation,  and  a  fail- 
ure to  notice  the  parallelism  in  the  Old  Testament 
account.  Of  course  it  would  not  be  diflScult  to  put 
too  much  stress  upon  the  influence  which  was  exerted 
by  the  Old  Testament,  and  in  no  case  ought  it  to  be 
divorced  from  the  all-pervasive  craving  after  miracles. 
One  certainly  is  not  to  think  of  a  conscious  feeling  of 
the  need  of  supplying  parallels  in  Jesus'  life,  without 
which  there  would  have  been  no  tendency  to  legend  at 
all.  A  well-defined  feeling  of  this  sort  does  not  appear 
to  have  existed,  for  it  is  rarely  that  we  find,  what  in 
such  a  case  we  might  look  to  find,  stories  which  mani- 
festly are  copies  throughout.  But  with  a  tendency  to 
legend  once  given,  and  sure  to  make  itself  felt  in  one 
form  or  another,  the  influence  of  the  Old  Testament 
would  go  a  long  way  to  determine  what  that  form 
should  be,  and  besides  would  give  an  immense  impetus 
to  the  whole  movement,  by  furnishing  ready  to  hand  a 
great  mass  of  material  in  every  way  suited  to  the  pur- 
pose, and  everywhere  familiar,  particularly  if  theologi- 
cal and  controversial  interests  stood  ready  to  give  each 
newly  discovered  point  of  contact  a  warm  welcome,  and 
find  for  it  general  acceptance.  Furthermore,  there  is 
the  possibility  that  a  saying  or  a  parable  may  have 
grown  into  a  narrative  of  a  real  event,  and  this  seems 
in  part  to  be  the  explanation  of  the  cursing  of  the  fig- 
tree.  This  story  is  not  creditable  to  Jesus,  and  one 
might  wish  to  get  rid  of  it  even  apart  from  the  miracle. 
There  seems  to  be  no  good  reason  for  thinking,  as  some 
have  done,  that  Jesus  meant  this  act  just  to  give  his 
disciples  a  striking  object-lesson,  with  the  Jewish  na- 


150       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  fesus. 

tion  as  its  text.  The  account  itself  hardly  would  sug- 
gest this,  but  rather  would  suggest  that  it  was  regarded 
as  an  illustration  of  the  power  which  faith  puts  in  the 
hands  of  the  believer,  for  this  is  all  that  Jesus  has  to 
say  in  explanation  of  it.  So  then,  when  we  find  that 
these  words  which  are  given  to  Jesus  really  were  spoken 
on  another  occasion,'  and  when  we  find  that  a  parable 
actually  has  come  down  to  us  about  a  barren  fig-tree 
which  was  threatened  with  condign  punishment,  it 
hardly  seems  necessary  to  hunt  any  further  for  an  ex- 
planation of  the  story.  These  three  tendencies  at  least 
we  may  constantly  be  on  the  lookout  for,  but  besides 
these  there  would  be  numberless  other  ways  in  which  a 
miracle-story  might  be  suggested.  It  would  be  hope- 
less at  the  present  day  to  expect  to  find  in  every  case 
just  what  the  starting-point  for  the  story  was,  but  it 
often  can  be  suggested  with  a  good  deal  of  probability. 
The  story  of  the  miraculous  feeding  may  be  taken  as 
an  example.  So  far  as  external  authority  goes  this  is 
the  best  attested  miracle  to  be  found  in  the  Gospels. 
Each  of  the  four  Evangelists  has  his  version  of  it,  and 
indeed  two  of  them  have  given  us  a  double  version, 
though  that  perhaps  is  hardly  to  be  reckoned  a  point 
in  its  favor.  But  unless  one  stands  ready  to  stick  by 
the  miraculous  through  thick  and  thin,  there  are  pe- 
culiar difficulties  about  this  story  which  make  it  very 
hard  to  accept  on  any  testimony.  Without  insisting 
on  the  fact  that  there  really  is  no  adequate  occasion  for 
so  stupendous  an  event,  our  narrative  brings  out  clearly 
a  difficulty,  which  often  is  suffered  to  drop  out  of  view 
by  reason  of  the  dim  religious  light  in  which  the  mira- 
cles are  kept  enveloped,  but  which  the  mind  inevitably 
feels  when  it  tries  to  picture  to  itself  a  miracle  as  actu- 

'  See  Ivuke,  17  :  6. 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  1 5  i 

ally  taking  place.  For  this  reason  the  healing-miracles 
are  somewhat  less  difficult  to  believe  in,  because  there 
the  process  is  a  hidden  one  and  does  not  appear  to  call 
for  a  very  close  scrutiny  ;  but  in  the  nature-miracles  it 
is  otherwise.  It  is  a  very  different  thing  to  say  in 
general  terms  that  God  has  omnipotent  power,  and 
actually  to  think  of  a  loaf  which  has  been  broken 
suddenly  become  whole  again,  or  of  a  new  loaf  in- 
stantly appearing  when  one  has  been  picked  up.  The 
whole  thing  has  an  air  of  magic  about  it,  of  legerde- 
main ;  it  is  what  we  expect  to  see  at  a  conjuror's  enter- 
tainment, and  instinctively  we  shrink  from  connecting 
it  with  Jesus.  In  this  story  too  there  are  points  of 
contact  with  the  Old  Testament,  but  perhaps  the  real 
clue  to  the  narrative  is  supplied  by  the  Fourth  Evan- 
gelist, when  he  connects  it  with  a  discourse  which 
points  to  the  I^ord's  Supper.  Jesus  sitting  at  the  head 
of  the  table,  blessing  the  food  and  distributing  it  to  his 
followers,  it  is  very  likely  that  we  have  here  a  reflection 
of  the  simple  love- feast  of  later  days  carried  back  into 
the  legendary  atmosphere  of  Jesus'  own  life. 

So  far  no  mention  has  been  made  of  a  theory  which 
in  the  past  has  had  a  great  place  in  the  criticism  of 
the  miracles,  and  which  must  always  be  recognized  as 
at  least  a  possibility.  After  the  suspicion  once  gains 
ground  that  miracles  are  of  doubtful  credibility,  the 
most  natural  step,  because  the  shortest,  is  to  assume 
that  some  real  historical  event  lies  at  the  bottom  of 
each  story,  but  has  been  given  a  wrong  twist  through 
misunderstandings  on  the  part  of  eye-witness  or  narra- 
tor. But  the  absurdities  into  which  the  old  rational- 
istic criticism  fell  in  trying  to  carry  out  this  method, 
furnish  a  sharp  admonition  that  the  method  is  at  any 
rate  to  be  employed  with  the  utmost  caution.     There 


152        The  Life  ajid  Teachings  of  yesus. 

are  decided  diiSculties  in  the  waj'  of  such  a  theoty.  If 
it  is  to  be  carried  out  with  any  plausibility  a  good  share 
of  the  blame  has  to  be  laid  upon  the  eye-witnesses 
themselves ;  and  the  existence  of  so  many  events  in 
Jesus'  life  which  would  lend  themselves  so  easily  to  a 
mistake,  together  with  the  negligence  of  Jesus  in  cor- 
recting these  mistakes,  and  the  verj^  considerable  degree 
of  stupidity  on  the  part  of  the  spectators,  is  in  itself 
extremely  odd.  But  in  the  case  of  one  particular  class 
of  events,  the  miracles  of  healing,  it  might  seem  that 
the  tlieor)^  stood  a  good  show  of  being  carried  out  with 
success,  and  it  will  be  necessary  to  examine  these  with 
some  detail. 

There  is  in  all  three  of  the  Gospels  the  account  of  an 
argument  which  Jesus  had  with  the  Pharisees  about  a 
demoniac  whom  Jesus  had  cured.  The  man  is  called 
a  dumb  demoniac  in  the  older  account,  and  there  is 
nothing  very  improbable  in  this,  though  the  fact  that 
in  Matthew  the  dumb  man  has  become  blind  as  well, 
ought  to  suggest  caution  about  relying  too  implicitly 
upon  details.  However,  the  main  point  is  that  a  re- 
markable cure  had  been  efiected  in  a  way  that  was  open 
and  undeniable,  and  this  much  must  be  regarded  as 
beyond  reasonable  doubt.  And  it  is  to  be  noticed  in 
passing  that  just  here,  when  for  the  first  time  we  get 
on  firm  ground,  the  miraculous  appears  in  a  particu- 
larly dubious  light.  This  matter  of  possession  fur- 
nishes a  striking  example  of  the  disturbing  influence 
which  a  wrong  point  of  view  to  start  with  may  exert. 
If  the  upholder  of  the  miracles  would  try  seriously  to 
realize  the  impression  which  a  case  of  this  sort  must 
make  upon  a  mind  not  already  prejudiced  in  favor  of 
the  miraculous,  he  perhaps  would  be  more  ready  to 
admit  some  reason  for  his  opponent's  scepticism.     For 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  1 5  3 

his  own  part  he  has  convinced  himself  already,  and  he 
can  afiford  to  pass  somewhat  lightly  over  what  makes 
against  him  ;  but  if  one  has  not  as  yet  reached  this 
position,  the  case  against  the  influence  of  demons  in 
disease  seems  as  complete  as  one  could  reasonably  ask 
for.  The  phenomena  known  as  possession  by  no 
means  appear  for  the  first  time  with  Jesus.  The  belief 
was  already  current  among  the  Jews  when  Jesus  was 
born,  and  it  is  continually  being  met  with  among  other 
nations  before  and  since.  This  very  passage  shows 
that  Jewish  exorcists  sometimes  were  successful  in 
their  treatment  of  such  cases  ;  and  in  the  days  of  the 
Fathers,  as  well  as  in  later  times,  there  are  well  au- 
thenticated instances  in  which  cures  were  effected  by 
means  which  were  looked  upon  as  miraculous.  Ac- 
cordingly, if  we  are  to  maintain  our  view  that  Jesus' 
cure  was  a  miracle,  and  the  actual  casting  out  of  a 
demon,  we  either  must  suppose  that  of  two  cases,  not 
outwardly  different,  the  one  is  a  miracle  and  the  other 
is  a  natural  event,  which  is  not  very  convincing ;  or 
we  must  say  that  the  others  too  were  miracles,  and  that 
the  Jews  before  Jesus'  time  were  divinely  guided  to  a 
correct  diagnosis  in  this  special  class  of  diseases,  and 
this  is  quite  as  unsatisfactory.  Moreover,  phenomena 
of  the  same  sort  occur  at  the  present  day,  and  have 
been  shown  beyond  any  doubt  to  come  from  natural 
causes.  The  whole  attempt  to  save  the  credit  of  the 
Evangelists  is  artificial,  and  does  not  deserve  considera- 
tion in  view  of  the  perfectly  obvious  explanation  that 
the  Evangelists  simply  were  accepting  the  erroneous 
belief  of  their  day,  as  of  course  it  was  to  be  expected 
they  would  do.  But  what  we  are  concerned  about 
more  particularly  is  the  explanation  which  Jesus  him- 
self gives  to  this  cure,   "If  I  by  the  power  of  God 


154       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

cast  out  demons,  then  doubtless  the  kingdom  of  God 
is  come  nigh  unto  you."  Now  in  just  this  case  such 
a  saying  was  true  in  a  special  manner.  Most  of  the 
diseases  which  were  classed  under  possession  were  very 
largely  of  a  mental  nature,  and  often  of  a  moral  na- 
ture as  well ;  that  is,  they  were  most  likely  to  prevail 
in  an  age  where,  along  with  an  intense  belief  in  the 
supernatural,  there  went  great  wickedness  and  highly 
wrought  passions  ;  and  the  breaking  of  the  power  of 
such  diseases  was  connected  in  an  immediate  way  with 
the  sane  and  healthful  views  of  the  kingdom  of  heaven 
which  Jesus  taught.  But  the  words  also  suggest  the 
question  whether  Jesus  did  not  carry  out  the  idea  fur- 
ther still.  It  is  perfectly  possible  that  a  strong  and 
beneficent  nature  such  as  Jesus'  was,  and  especially  in 
such  an  age  as  the  age  in  which  Jesus  lived,  might 
have  had  a  much  wider  influence  over  sickness  than 
this ;  that  Jesus  might  have  carried  on  a  somewhat 
extended  ministr}^  of  healing  which  he  looked  upon  as 
a  special  token  of  God's  presence,  and  which  he  thus 
appealed  to  in  support  of  his  mission. 

Now  it  must  be  noticed  that  this  is  rather  more  than 
can  fairly  be  got  out  of  the  argument  with  the  Phari- 
sees when  taken  by  itself,  for  it  is  not  just  the  same 
thing  to  make  a  passing  argument  ad  homineni  in  an- 
swer to  an  attack  which  actually  has  been  made  upon 
him,  and  really  to  rest  his  authority  upon  this  argu- 
ment, and  make  continual  use  of  it.  Still  the  latter 
is  not  impossible,  or  even  very  unlikely.  To  be  sure 
we  may  not  like  to  find  that  Jesus  has  fallen  into  such 
a  mistake,  but  the  possibility  that  he  should  be  mis- 
taken must  be  conceded.  If  he  had  found  himself 
possessed  of  the  power  of  working  remarkable  cures, 
it  is  conceivable,  with  his  vivid  sense  of  God's  imme- 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  1 5  5 

diate  presence  in  the  universe,  that  he  should  have  at- 
tributed his  success  more  directly  to  God's  special  and 
unusual  agency  than  one  who  had  a  more  modern  and 
scientific  view  of  the  world  would  feel  justified  in  do- 
ing. And  this  might  seem  to  account  admirably  for 
several  puzzling  things  in  the  Gospels.  It  would  ac- 
count for  the  unwavering  and  comparatively  early  testi- 
mony to  such  miracles  of  healing  in  Jesus'  life  ;  it  would 
account  for  a  number  of  sayings  attributed  to  Jesus  in 
which  he  seems  to  claim  for  himself  miraculous  power  ; 
and  it  would  serve  at  least  as  a  basis  in  accounting  for 
those  narratives  which  have  been  especially  stubborn 
in  resisting  a  mythical  and  legendary  explanation. 

So  far  as  the  general  descriptions  of  Jesus'  healing 
go,  when  they  are  not  backed  by  something  concrete 
and  definite  they  cannot  be  held  to  count  for  very  much 
as  evidence.  The  greater  part  of  them  are  due  to 
Mark,  and  they  seem  to  be  nothing  more  than  infer- 
ences or  generalizations  from  the  concrete  stories.  If 
the  source  from  which  Mark  drew  told  how  the  disci- 
ples had  been  commissioned  to  heal  the  sick,  and  then 
if  Mark  proceeds  to  tell  how  the  sick  were  healed,  his 
statement  cannot  be  assigned  any  independent  value. 
Moreover,  if  cures  really  did  occur  in  the  case  of  de- 
moniacs, as  we  are  ready  to  admit,  even  though  there 
may  have  been  no  great  number  of  them,  this  would 
be  quite  enough  to  give  a  start  to  tradition,  and  it  only 
would  require  a  moderate  amount  of  time  to  grow  into 
a  general  healing  ministry.  But  this  tells  nothing  as 
to  what  Jesus'  attitude  towards  these  cures  may  have 
been,  and  to  answer  this  question  it  will  be  necessary 
to  examine,  first  the  sayings  which  are  attributed  to 
Jesus,  and  then  the  narratives  of  special  cures  which 
seem  to  deserve  particular  attention. 


156       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

When  John  sent  messengers  to  Jesus  to  ask  him 
about  his  Messiahship,  Jesus  did  not  send  back  a 
direct  answer.  "Tell  John,"  he  says,  "the  things 
which  5'e  do  hear  and  see  :  the  blind  receive  their  sight, 
the  lepers  are  cleansed,  and  the  deaf  hear,  and  the  dead 
are  raised  up,  and  the  poor  have  good  tidings  preached 
to  them.  And  blessed  is  he  who.soever  shall  find  none 
occasion  of  stumbling  in  me. ' '  This  reply  is  not  alto- 
gether above  suspicion,  and  yet  there  does  not  seem  to  be 
ground  enough  for  rejecting  it  in  its  essential  features. 
Assuming  then  that  words  resembling  these  really  were 
spoken  by  Jesus,  on  the  surface  they  might  seem  to  fur- 
nish an  answer  to  the  question,  and  to  show  that  Jesus 
had  performed  some  remarkable  cures  upon  which  he 
was  content  to  rest  the  proof  of  his  Messiahship.  But  as 
soon  as  one  begins  to  examine  the  answer,  he  will  see 
that  this  is  by  no  means  so  certain  as  it  might  appear. 
To  be  sure  it  must  be  admitted  that  in  their  present 
form  the  words  refer  most  naturally  to  the  actual  heal- 
ing of  diseases,  and  the  Evangelists  evidently  under- 
stand them  in  this  way  ;  but  there  is  nothing  at  all 
violent  in  the  supposition  that  the  sa^dng  may  have 
been  modified  somewhat  in  the  course  of  transmission, 
through  a  desire  that  it  .should  conform  more  exactly 
to  the  cures  which  actually  were  reported  of  Jesus. 
And  in  favor  of  this  there  are  two  facts  to  be  consid- 
ered. In  the  first  place  the  selection  of  examples  is 
strange  in  Jesus'  mouth.  The  cure  of  demoniacs,  which 
is  well  attested,  is  not  mentioned  at  all,  and  the  things 
which  are  mentioned,  the  cleansing  of  lepers  and  most 
of  all  the  raising  of  the  dead,  even  the  Gospels  recog- 
nize as  marking  an  exceptional  height  of  Jesus'  power, 
so  that  they  could  not  have  been  spoken  of  in  this  way 
as  ordinary  occurrences.     But  it  would  have  been  quite 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  157 

natural  for  a  later  disciple  to  choose  for  his  samples 
those  instances  which  seemed  to  him  most  striking. 
And  again  there  is  the  fact  that  undoubtedly  the  say- 
ing has  a  reference  in  it  to  a  set  of  passages  in  the  book 
of  Isaiah,  and  so  is  likely  in  the  first  instance  to  have 
corresponded  somewhat  more  closely  to  these  than  it 
does  at  present.  But  at  any  rate  this  connection  with 
Isaiah  has  an  important  bearing  on  the  manner  in 
which  the  saying  ought  to  be  interpreted.  In  Isaiah 
these  passages  in  part  describe  in  a  highly  figurative 
way  the  blessings  of  the  Messianic  age,  and  in  part 
they  refer  solely  and  unmistakably  to  facts  which  are 
purely  spiritual  ;  in  no  case  however  would  they  be 
satisfied  by  the  bodily  healing  of  a  few  sick  people. 
Now  it  certainly  is  true  that  Jesus  might  have  under- 
stood that  these  words  were  to  be  literally  fulfilled,  but 
it  also  is  true  that  a  mistake  of  this  kind  is  just  what 
Jesus  is  least  likely  to  fall  into.  Jesus  is  not  accus- 
tomed to  misapply  passages  which  have  a  spiritual 
meaning  in  a  literal  way,  but,  on  the  contrary,  he  is 
more  likely  to  pierce  down  to  the  spiritual  meaning  of 
literal  words  ;  and  on  account  of  this  we  seldom  are 
justified  in  taking  the  baldly  literal  meaning  of  Jesus' 
sayings  unless  we  find  that  a  deeper  meaning  is  forced 
and  unnatural.  But  here,  if  once  we  admit  that  Jesus 
intends  a  quotation,  there  is  no  difficulty  in  the  least. 
Jesus  does  not  say  to  John,  Look  at  the  miracles  which 
I  do,  and  divine  my  spiritual  rank  from  them  ;  but  what 
he  says  is  this  :  I  cannot  answer  your  question  directly, 
because  to  you  and  to  me  the  question  does  not  mean 
the  same.  I  only  can  point  you  to  the  place  where  you 
will  find  w^hat  my  conception  of  the  coming  one  is,  and 
ask  you  to  look  for  the  fulfilling  of  that  prophecy  in  my 
life.      If  to  you  the  Messiah  is  one  who  comes  to  heal 


158       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  fesus. 

the  spiritual  ills  of  men,  to  make  the  Gospel  of  divine 
truth  the  common  propertj^  of  all,  yes,  I  am  the  Mes- 
siah ;  and  blessed  is  he  whosoever  shall  find  none  occa- 
sion of  stumbling  in  me.  And  there  are  a  number  of 
things  which  go  to  show  that  this  interpretation  is.  the 
right  one.  The  closing  sentence  of  Jesus'  words  indicates 
that  the  proof  which  he  had  offered  was  not  one  which 
he  had  much  hope  would  appeal  to  men,  but  which  was 
more  like  to  put  a  stumbling-block  in  their  way  ;  and 
this  was  not  true  of  the  proof  from  miracles,  which  is 
frankly  and  without  disguise  a  popular  appeal.  More- 
over, a  reference  to  miracles  would  be  no  real  answer  to 
John's  question.  If  miracles  had  been  performed  John 
must  have  felt  all  their  force  before  he  sent  to  Jesus  ; 
and  if  he  still  were  in  doubt,  what  would  be  gained  by 
sending  back  word  to  him,  lyook  to  the  miracles  ?  Was 
this  really  the  strongest  proof  that  Jesus  had  to  offer  ? 
And  a  closer  examination  of  the  words  themselves  will 
point  to  the  same  thing  :  ' '  the  dead  are  raised  up,  the 
poor  have  good  tidings  preached  to  them. "  "  The  poor 
have  good  tidbigs  preached  to  themy  Jesus'  teaching  is 
not  to  be  got  rid  of  altogether  then ;  but  in  this  case 
it  comes  in  in  a  secondary  way,  as  an  afterthought. 
Moreover,  it  destroys  the  unity  of  the  saying  ;  the  last 
clause  brings  in  something  which  is  entirely  out  of 
harmony  with  the  rest  of  the  sentence,  an  argument 
of  a  totally  different  kind.  And  yet  there  is  no  indica- 
tion that  the  train  of  thought  has  been  shifted,  and 
from  the  structure  of  the  sentence  one  never  would 
suspect  the  presence  of  a  double  line  of  argument.  If, 
therefore,  one  clause  can  refer  to  nothing  else  than 
Jesus'  spiritual  ministry,  and  if  the  rest  of  the  sen- 
tence may  be  interpreted  in  more  ways  than  one,  the 
part  which  is  unequivocal  ought  to  be  allowed  the 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  159 

casting  vote.  The  figurative  meaning  is  then,  we 
think,  by  far  the  more  natural  meaning ;  but,  it  is 
said,  John  would  not  have  understood  it  in  this  way. 
Undoubtedly  he  would  not  have  understood  it  so  if 
he  had  known  of  remarkable  cures  on  Jesus'  part  which 
were  thought  to  be  miraculous  and  to  which  he  could 
apply  the  words  ;  but  if  he  had  not  known  of  these 
he  could  not  have  understood  it  otherwise.  But  the 
cures  of  Jesus  are  just  what  we  have  to  establish  ;  till 
they  are  established  we  can  only  take  the  words  in  the 
most  probable  way.  And  taking  them  in  this  way, 
they  exclude  the  cures. 

And  for  this  conclusion  the  words  of  Jesus  to  the 
Pharisees  when  they  asked  him  for  a  sign  tell  very 
strongly  indeed.  "  An  evil  and  adulterous  generation 
seeketh  after  a  sign,  and  there  shall  no  sign  be  given 
it  but  the  sign  of  Jonah  the  prophet.  The  men  of 
Nineveh  shall  stand  up  in  the  judgment  with  this 
generation  and  shall  condemn  it ;  for  they  repented  at 
the  preaching  of  Jonah,  and  behold  a  greater  than 
Jonah  is  here. ' '  The  first  Evangelist  understands  this 
as  a  reference  to  the  resurrection,  but  there  can  be  no 
doubt  that  he  is  mistaken  ;  Jesus  explains  it  himself, 
and  explains  it  of  his  teaching.  I^et  us  notice  carefully 
what  Jesus  says  :  he  rebukes  an  anxiety  for  miraculous 
signs  as  belonging  to  an  evil  and  adulterous  generation, 
he  declares  absolutely  that  no  sign  shall  be  given  to  it, 
and  he  appeals  wholly  to  the  truth  and  the  self-evi- 
dential nature  of  his  preaching.  If  the  Pharisees  had 
known  about  the  miracles  of  healing,  how  could  they 
still  have  asked  for  a  sign  ?  they  had  a  sign  already, 
and  then  too  a  knowledge  of  Jesus'  power  must  have 
made  them  hesitate  to  provoke  a  display  of  it  which 
should  be  to  their  own  disadvantage.     If  Jesus  had 


1 60       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  yesus. 

performed  cures  which  he  thought  were  miraculous, 
and  had  appealed  to  them  as  his  authority,  how  could 
he  have  spoken  of  signs  as  he  does  speak  of  them? 
The  whole  passage  is  an  unequivocal  denial  of  the 
miraculous  in  Jesus'  life  ;  and  because  it  goes  clean 
against  the  tendencies  which  were  working  in  tradition, 
and  because  it  has  besides  all  the  antecedent  probabili- 
ties in  its  favor,  it  is  worth  much  more  as  evidence 
than  any  saying  on  the  other  side  could  be.  And  along 
with  this  we  may  notice  the  fact  that  the  people  were 
so  slow  in  thinking  of  Jesus  as  the  Messiah.  If  Jesus 
had  engaged  in  an  extended  ministrj^  of  healing  which 
was  thought  to  be  miraculous,  and  if  he  himself  had 
appealed  to  these  miracles,  this  fact  is  very  difficult  to 
explain. 

Among  the  other  sayings  of  Jesus  whose  authenticity 
cannot  fairly  be  questioned,  there  is  only  one,  apart 
from  the  narratives  of  special  cures,  which  seems  to 
claim  a  miraculous  power,  and  this  is  the  Woe  against 
the  Galilean  cities.  Here  again  probably  it  would  be 
hypercritical  to  deny  that  by  ' '  mighty  works ' '  the 
Evangelists  thought  that  miracles  were  meant,  and  it 
may  be  that  the  word  itself  can  mean  nothing  less  than 
this.  And  yet  there  are  two  great  objections  against 
understanding  the  saying  in  this  way  ;  it  implies  what 
in  other  words  of  his  Jesus  seems  expressly  to  exclude, 
and  it  places  the  people's  guilt  in  their  rejection  of  his 
miracles  and  not  in  the  rejection  of  his  teaching,  which 
is  utterly  opposed  to  what  we  know  of  Jesus.  In  an- 
other place  where  Jesus  is  referring  to  this  same  thing, 
to  his  rejection  by  the  people,  he  speaks  simpl}^  of  his 
teaching  ministry  :  ' '  We  have  eaten  and  drunk  in  thy 
presence,  and  thou  hast  taught  in  our  streets,"  he 
represents  the  people  as  saying,  while  of  miracles  he 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  1 6 1 

gives  no  hint.  It  is  true  that  in  Matthew,  in  this  same 
passage,  there  is  a  direct  allusion  to  miracles,  and  this 
shows  how  easily  such  an  allusion  could  be  brought 
into  Jesus'  words,  when  it  did  not  at  all  belong  there. 
For  that  we  have  the  genuine  form  in  Ivuke  and  not  in 
Matthew  will  appear  when  we  notice  that  in  lyuke 
Jesus'  words  are  addressed  to  his  unbelieving  country- 
men, which  must  be  the  meaning  of  the  passage,  while 
Matthew  refers  them  to  unfaithful  Christians,  Chris- 
tians who  prophesied  in  Jesus'  name,  and  cast  out 
demons,  and  did  many  wonderful  works,  but  who  yet 
were  workers  of  lawlessness, — a  phenomenon  which 
belongs  not  to  Jesus'  day,  but  to  the  times  when  the 
Evangelist  wrote.  We  think  then  that  Jesus  can  only 
be  referring  in  general  to  his  ministry,  and  to  the 
power  of  God  which  had  been  manifested  through  him, 
and  not  to  wonderful  cures  which  he  had  wrought. 
Even  if  dvvajM?  can  hardly  mean  this,  yet  we  have  no 
evidence  as  to  just  what  w^ord  it  was  that  Jesus  used, 
particularly  if  we  have  to  do  with  a  translation.  At 
any  rate  either  this  saying  or  the  saying  about  a  sign 
has  to  be  turned  from  its  more  obvious  meaning,  and 
we  do  not  hesitate  to  say  that  here  the  diflSculty  in  do- 
ing this  is  vastly  less. 

We  now  have  examined  those  sayings  which  seem  to 
us  to  be  from  Jesus  and  which  have  a  bearing  on  the 
question  ;  but  there  still  remain  a  number  besides 
which  cannot  be  received  with  so  much  confidence. 
One  of  these,  which  is  present  in  the  charge  to  the 
Twelve,  we  shall  have  to  examine  with  some  thorough- 
ness at  a  later  point,  and  so  to  save  repetition  we  will 
pass  it  by  for  the  time  being,  and  turn  to  the  others. 
And  we  should  like  to  anticipate  here  a  criticism  which 
no  doubt  will  be  made,  that  it  is  easy  enough  to  prove 


1 62        The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

a  point  when  one  is  at  liberty  to  explain  away  all  the 
evidence  on  the  other  side.  But  because  a  point  can 
only  be  established  after  opposing  evidence  is  tested 
and  rejected,  this  need  not  give  rise  to  any  presumption 
against  its  being  true  ;  and  it  is  a  cheap  triumph  to 
dismiss  it  with  the  words  "explained  away."  As  a 
matter  of  fact  it  is  the  very  nature  of  human  testimony 
that  it  should  be  conflicting,  and  a  great  part  of  the 
critic's  duty  is  to  find  out,  if  he  can,  what  part  of  the 
evidence  cannot  be  relied  on.  That  there  always  will 
be  much  which  cannot  be  relied  on  we  have  to  expect, 
and  there  is  nothing  which  would  lead  us  not  to  look 
for  it  in  the  Gospels  also.  Now  here  we  have  tried  to 
show  a  probability  that  Jesus  did  not  believe  himself  to 
have  worked  miraculous  cures.  In  so  far  as  this  has 
been  established,  opposing  evidence  must  be  looked  on 
with  suspicion,  and  if  other  good  grounds  for  doubting 
it  are  found,  it  may  reasonably  be  rejected.  And  to 
start  in  with,  it  must  be  noted  that  these  sayings  do 
not  go  back,  as  the  others  did,  to  the  earlier  tradition, 
but  are  due  to  Mark  or  else  to  I,uke,  and  this  greatly 
weakens  the  external  witness  in  their  favor.  The  in- 
stances in  Luke  may  be  taken  first,  and  here  in  every 
case  the  connection  which  is  given  to  the  saying  is 
particularly  doubtful.  The  first  case  is  found  in  the 
storj'  of  Jesus'  visit  to  Nazareth,  and  against  this  story 
there  are  decided  objections.  In  Mark  there  is  an 
earlier  account  of  a  rejection  at  Nazareth,  and  with  this 
Luke's  account  does  not  very  well  agree  ;  and  while 
of  course  there  is  nothing  against  two  visits  to  the 
place,  two  rejections  are  hardly  to  be  thought  of. 
Moreover,  any  attempt  to  make  two  different  events 
out  of  the  different  versions  is  opposed  by  the  fact  that 
nearly  all  of  Mark  has  been  worked  by  Luke  into  his 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  163 

own  narrative.  We  say  "worked  in,"  because  the 
elements  seem  more  original  by  far  in  Mark.  In  I^uke 
the  sceptical  question  which  the  neighbors  ask  comes 
in  very  abruptly,  after  a  sentence  which  gives  just  the 
opposite  impression,  that  Jesus'  words  had  aroused 
their  admiration  ;  Mark,  however,  has  already  led  up 
to  this  question.  And  again  the  proverb  which  Jesus 
puts  to  them  is  introduced  by  Mark  after  the  rejection 
has  taken  place,  while  in  lyuke  it  seems  a  rather  un- 
gracious anticipation  of  this  rejection.  And  besides 
this  there  is  the  fact  which,  as  will  be  seen  later,  is 
very  improbable,  that  Jesus  openly  proclaims  himself 
as  the  Messiah  ;  there  is  the  saying  of  Jesus,  "  Physi- 
cian, heal  thyself,"  whose  meaning  in  this  connection 
never  has  been  settled  ;  and  there  is  the  miracle  at  the 
end,  which  is  the  more  improbable  as  Mark  knows 
nothing  of  any  violence  offered  to  Jesus.  The  whole 
narrative  then  appears  to  have  grown  out  of  the  earlier 
form  in  Mark,  and  to  have  reached  its  present  shape 
mainly  through  a  desire  to  have  a  frontispiece  which 
should  exhibit  in  miniature  the  later  and  national  re- 
jection by  the  Jews.  So  if  the  saying  about  Elijah  and 
Elisha  was  really  spoken  by  Jesus,  as  is  not  impossible, 
at  least  it  was  not  spoken  in  this  connection,  and 
consequently  there  is  not  the  slightest  thing  to  show  that 
it  referred  to  miracles.  Nor  indeed  in  this  connection 
even  is  such  a  reference  necessary.  And  the  other 
two  cases  to  be  found  in  Luke  are  quite  as  doubtful. 
In  one  of  these,  when  the  Pharisees  warn  Jesus  against 
Herod,  the  greater  part  of  Jesus'  answer  is  taken  from 
an  entirely  different  connection  in  the  discourse  against 
the  Pharisees,  and  this  is  shown  by  the  fact  that  the 
closing  words  addressed  to  Jerusalem,  "Ye  shall  not 
see  me  henceforth, ' '  are  obviously  inappropriate  when 


164       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

Jesus  had  just  declared  that  he  was  on  the  way  to  Jeru- 
salem. We  cannot  therefore  rest  with  any  confidence 
on  the  few  words  which  still  remain,  for  they  have  no 
special  guarantee  of  genuineness,  and  the  way  in  which 
Jesus  makes  his  ministry  consist  in  nothing  else  but 
healing  is  decidedly  improbable.  The  other  case  is 
where  the  disciples  come  back  from  their  mission  and 
tell  Jesus  of  the  cures  they  have  wrought.  The  legen- 
dary character  of  Jesus'  answer  is  strongly  marked  in 
one  part  of  it,  where  he  gives  his  followers  authority  to 
tread  on  serpents  and  escape  all  hurt ;  but  the  great 
objection  to  the  incident  is  the  fact  that  it  does  not 
agree  with  the  narrative  to  which  Luke  joins  it,  and 
which  of  necessity  it  implies.  In  that  narrative  Jesus 
authorizes  the  disciples  whom  he  is  sending  out  to 
cast  out  demons,  but  here  the  power  over  demons 
appears  as  something  unexpected.  L,uke  himself 
notices  this  hitch  in  the  connection,  and  so  he  leaves 
all  reference  to  the  demons  out  of  Jesus'  charge.  And 
to  make  assurance  doubly  sure,  even  if  the  incident 
could  be  shown  to  belong  to  this  connection,  that  very 
fact,  as  we  shall  show  in  another  place,  would  be  fatal 
to  it. 

After  Ivuke  it  would  be  in  order  next  to  take  the 
instances  in  Mark,  but  because  these  are  so  closely 
connected  with  the  larger  question  as  to  the  general 
credibility  of  Mark's  additions,  we  shall  pass  them  by 
for  the  moment,  content  with  the  main  results  which 
we  have  reached.  It  is  to  be  remembered  that  at  best 
Jesus'  words  only  establish  the  existence  of  strange 
cures  effected  by  him,  and  not  that  these  cures  were  mir- 
acles ;  and  it  would  be  easier  to  think  that  Jesus  was 
mistaken  than,  simply  to  save  his  authority,  to  suppose 
the  miracles  were  real  ones.      But  we  have  tried  to 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  165 

show  that  of  the  sayings  which  bear  upon  the  question, 
after  we  have  thrown  out  those  whose  genuineness  is 
so  doubtful  that  as  evidence  they  can  count  for  nothing, 
there  is  one  which  denies  distinctly  any  connection 
on  Jesus'  part  with  miraculous  signs,  and  there  is 
only  one  which  can  fairly  be  used  to  prove  the  con- 
trary, and  that  this  is  open  to  another  meaning.  When 
therefore  we  turn  to  the  stories  themselves  which  we 
have  in  the  Gospels,  there  is,  we  think,  a  certain 
presumption  against  their  being  true.  At  least  we 
may  expect  to  find  a  large  admixture  of  legend,  for  it 
would  be  strange  indeed  if,  when  the  nature-miracles 
have  so  much  of  legend  in  them,  none  should  be  pre- 
sent in  the  cures  as  well.  Nevertheless  there  are  cer- 
tain of  the  cures  which  seem  to  have  special  marks  of 
genuineness  which  the  nature-miracles  do  not  have, 
and  these  are  the  ones  which  we  shall  examine  first. 
The  most  prominent  of  these  are  the  Sabbath  cures, 
and  these  apparently  are  four  in  number.  But  this  list 
has  carefully  to  be  sifted,  and  we  have  shown  already 
how  three  of  them  depend  upon  a  single  story  which 
was  present  in  the  source.  And  now  the  words  of 
Jesus,  which  Matthew  and  Luke  both  have  retained, 
the  illustration  of  a  sheep  fallen  into  a  pit,  without  doubt 
are  genuine.  But  in  how  far  does  this  saying  make  the 
miracle  necessary  ?  If  we  compare  Matthew  and  Luke 
we  find  that  the  account  originally  opened  with  a  ques- 
tion, about  which  both  Evangelists  agree,  "  Is  it  lawful 
to  heal  on  the  Sabbath  day  ?  "  ;  only  Luke  gives  this 
question  to  Jesus,  while  Matthew  attributes  it  to  the 
Pharisees.  And  Matthew  here  has  the  probabilities  in 
his  favor,  for  such  questions  often  were  put  to  Jesus  by 
the  Pharisees,  while  Jesus  knew  verj'  well  what  the 
Pharisees  believed  about  it.      Luke's  change,  besides, 


1 66       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  yesus. 


can  be  explained  by  comparing  him  with  Mark,  for 
Mark  too  has  a  very  similar  question  put  in  Jesus' 
mouth.  But  as  soon  as  we  admit  this,  at  once  it  be- 
comes probable  that  we  have  to  do,  not  with  a  miracle 
at  all,  but  only  with  a  theoretical  question,  like  the 
question  about  the  great  commandment  or  about  di- 
vorce, by  which  the  Pharisees  constantly  were  trying 
to  entrap  Jesus.  It  is  not  likely,  as  Matthew  repre- 
sents, that  the  Pharisees  would  have  asked  the  question 
to  lead  Jesus  into  a  real  violation  of  the  law,  for  if  the 
cure  had  seemed  to  be  miraculous  of  course  it  would 
have  put  them  to  confusion  ;  nor  is  it  likely  that  in  the 
presence  of  a  miracle  the  Pharisees  would  have  ventured 
to  make  any  objection.  And  the  nature  of  the  cure 
itself  bears  this  out,  for  the  withered  hand  and  the 
command  of  Jesus  point  clearly  to  the  Old  Testament 
story  of  Jeroboam.  At  first  then,  we  must  think,  there 
was  only  a  question  which  was  put  to  Jesus,  and  which 
he  answered  in  this  way  ;  but  afterwards  it  was  sup- 
posed that  Jesus  pointed  his  moral  with  an  actual  cure, 
and  so,  following  a  story  in  the  Old  Testament,  the 
miracle  crept  into  the  narrative.  How,  as  the  Gospel 
literature  grew,  other  accounts,  slightly  differing,  arose 
out  of  this,  it  still  is  possible  to  trace.  And  in  the 
meanwhile  in  a  different  field,  tradition  had  taken  still 
another  turn,  and  as  a  result  we  have  the  story  of  the 
woman  bowed  together.  In  itself  this  story  is  suspi- 
cious, for,  not  to  insist  upon  its  late  appearance,  the 
bearing  of  the  ruler  of  the  synagogue  in  the  presence 
of  a  miracle  is  far  from  being  probable,  and  the  corre- 
spondence between  the  cure  and  the  illustration  is  too 
ingenious  to  be  natural.  But  what  is  fatal  to  it  is  its 
evident  resemblance  to  the  other  stor>' ;  and  since  it 
imitates  this,  not  only  in  the  illustration  which  it  puts 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  167 

in  Jesus'  mouth,  but  also  in  the  later  addition  of  a  mir- 
acle, it  cannot  be  allowed  any  authority. 

And  in  the  other  case  where  a  saying  of  Jesus  is  closely 
connected  with  a  cure,  the  case  of  the  palsied  man,  in 
spite  of  the  confidence  with  which  the  genuineness  of 
the  saying  has  been  said  to  be  self-evident,  we  cannot 
think  that  this  is  so.  ' '  Who  is  this  that  forgiveth 
sins  also  ?  "  say  the  Pharisees  ;  and  Jesus  answers, 
' '  Whether  is  easier,  to  say  Thy  sins  are  forgiven  ;  or 
to  say  Arise  and  walk  ?  But  that  ye  may  know  that 
the  Son  of  man  hath  power  on  earth  to  forgive  sins, — 
Arise,  and  take  up  thy  bed,  and  go  unto  thy  house." 
lyCt  us  notice  that  here  the  cure  is  only  a  secondary 
thing,  performed  just  to  let  the  Pharisees  know  that 
the  Son  of  man  hath  power  on  earth  to  forgive  sins. 
This  is  the  motive  of  the  whole  narrative  ;  the  claim 
is  not  forced  from  Jesus,  but  he  expressly  leads  to  it. 
Now  who  is  it  likely  would  have  been  most  anxious  to 
prove  the  authority  of  Jesus  to  forgive  sins,  and  would 
have  thought  that  this  was  established  satisfactorily 
by  a  miracle,  Jesus  himself,  or  a  disciple  who  was 
occupied  with  theories  about  Jesus'  person  and 
authority  ?  We  think  that  there  can  be  but  one 
answer  to  the  question.  And  as  an  incident  in  Jesus' 
life  there  are  two  strong  objections  to  this  story  :  it 
goes  upon  a  view  which  we  know  is  a  mistaken  view, 
and  which  a  man  of  Jesus'  spiritual  insight  is  not 
likely  to  have  held,  that  sickness  is  sent  as  a  punish- 
ment for  sin,  and  it  contradicts  other  facts  in  Jesus' 
life.  We  shall  find  that  Jesus  in  his  public  life  care- 
fully avoided  any  direct  claim  to  be  the  Messiah,  and 
that  his  Messiahship  for  a  long  time  was  not  suspected. 
But  this  claim  which  Jesus  makes  without  any  provo- 
cation really  involves  a  claim  to  be  Messiah,  and  it  is 


1 68       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

hard  to  understand  how  the  Pharisees  could  have 
avoided  seeing  it. 

And  now  let  us  take  another  narrative  which  it  has 
been  thought  makes  a  miracle  by  Jesus  necessary,  and 
which  we  agree  has  a  strong  appearance  of  being  gen- 
uine, the  narrative  of  the  Syro-Phcenician  woman.  It 
ma}'  make  the  matter  plainer  to  reproduce  the  story  in 
full  as  it  is  given  in  Matthew. 

' '  And  Jesus  went  out  thence,  and  withdrew  into  the 
parts  of  Tyre  and  Sidon.  And  behold,  a  Canaanitish 
woman  came  out  from  those  borders,  and  cried,  saying, 
Have  mercy  on  me,  O  Lord,  thou  son  of  David  ;  my 
daughter  is  grievously  vexed  with  a  demon.  But  he 
answered  her  not  a  word.  And  his  disciples  came  and 
besought  him,  saying,  Send  her  away  ;  for  she  crieth 
after  us.  But  he  answered  and  said,  I  was  not  sent 
but  unto  the  lost  sheep  of  the  house  of  Israel.  But 
she  came  and  worshipped  him,  saying.  Lord,  help  me. 
And  he  answered  and  said.  It  is  not  meet  to  take  the 
children's  bread  and  cast  it  to  the  dogs.  But  she  said. 
Yea,  Lord  :  for  even  the  dogs  eat  of  the  crumbs  which 
fall  from  their  masters'  table.  Then  Jesus  answered 
and  said  unto  her,  O  woman,  great  is  thy  faith  :  be  it 
done  unto  thee  even  as  thou  wilt.  And  her  daughter 
was  healed  from  that  hour. ' ' 

Now  in  the  first  place,  a  part  of  this  story,  the  words 
of  the  disciples  and  Jesus'  answer  to  them,  is  not  found 
in  Mark  ;  was  it  originally  a  part  of  the  narrative  ?  A 
majority  of  critics  have  said  that  it  does  belong  to  the 
original  story,  but  in  spite  of  this  we  have  no  hesita- 
tion in  answering  the  other  way.  We  will  not  argue 
that  these  words  of  Jesus  are  oppo.sed  to  Jesus'  own 
point  of  view,  for  this  is  something  that  we  have  still 
to  prove  ;  we  only  point  out  their  connection  with  an- 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  169 

other  sentence  which  is  attributed  to  Jesus.  "  Go  not 
into  any  way  of  the  Gentiles,  and  enter  not  into  any 
city  of  the  Samaritans  :  but  go  rather  to  the  lost  sheep 
of  the  house  of  Israel,'' — here  we  have  the  same  phrase 
and  the  same  point  of  view.  In  the  case  of  every 
other  saying  in  the  Gospels  which  is  found  in  two  or 
more  connections,  there  is  reason  to  believe  that  only 
one  of  these  connections  is  a  true  one,  and  here  there- 
fore it  is  probable  that  we  have  no  exception.  And 
we  actually  find  that  while  in  the  instructions  to  the 
disciples  the  phrase  is  closety  bound  up  with  the  context, 
in  the  case  of  the  miracle  the  phrase  is  brought  in  quite 
violently.  In  Mark's  account  the  woman  comes  to 
Jesus  and  makes  her  request,  and  this  is  what  naturally 
she  would  do.  But  in  Matthew  she  follows  Jesus  for 
some  distance,  shouting  aloud  to  him,  which  is  much 
less  likely.  And  even  in  Matthew,  after  the  object  of 
this  strange  proceeding  is  accomplished  and  Jesus  has 
been  given  an  opportunity  to  utter  the  saying  which 
has  been  put  into  his  mouth,  the  woman  comes  at  once 
to  Jesus  and  makes  her  request  in  a  reasonable  way, 
just  as  she  does  in  Mark.  Mark's  account  then,  we 
think,  is  the  original  account ;  and  in  this  form  it  seems 
at  first,  as  we  have  already  admitted,  somewhat  violent 
to  deny  its  genuineness.  Indeed,  we  should  like  to  be- 
lieve that  so  charming  a  story  in  the  main  was  true, 
and  we  should  be  inclined  to  do  so  if  it  were  not  for 
one  thing  about  it,  the  curious  relation  which  it  bears 
to  another  story  in  the  Gospels,  the  story  of  the  centu- 
rion's son.  Just  as  soon  as  we  get  rid  of  the  additions 
by  Matthew  we  see  that  the  parallelism  is  complete. 
Both  are  concerned  with  Gentiles  ;  then  in  one  we  have 
a  father  asking  help  for  his  son,  in  the  other  a  mother 
for  her  daughter ;  both  centre  about  a  clever  saying 


1 70       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

uttered  by  the  suppliant,  the  only  instances  of  the  kind 
in  the  Gospels  ;  in  both  Jesus,  contrary'  to  his  usual 
custom,  commends  highly  the  faith  which  is  displayed  ; 
in  both  he  heals  the  sufferer  at  a  distance,  again  the 
only  instances  of  this  ;  both  narratives  close  with  the 
same  words.  If  either  of  these  narratives  had  stood 
alone  we  should  have  hesitated  much  before  we  doubted 
it,  but  with  both  of  them  together,  \\dthout  hesitation 
we  must  reject  them  both.  That  in  the  only  two  in- 
stances in  which  Jesus  came  in  contact  with  a  Gentile, 
the  circumstances,  unusual  in  themselves,  should  have 
been  exactly  the  same,  is  almost  impossible,  so  that  we 
can  only  regard  it  as  a  clever  attempt  to  picture,  by 
two  companion  stories,  the  faith  of  the  Gentiles  carried 
back  into  Jesus'  own  life. 

The  narratives  of  healing  for  which  the  most  can  be 
said  we  have  now  considered,  and  have  found  reason 
to  reject  them  all,  without,  we  hope,  using  means  that 
are  too  forced.  And  now  the  rest  of  the  cures  it  be- 
comes ver)^  hazardous  to  retain,  particularly  as  in  the 
most  of  them  there  are  clear  marks  of  legend.  As  an 
example  we  maj^  take  the  raising  of  Jairus'  daughter  ; 
after  we  throw  out  Mark's  additions  and  go  back  to 
the  earliest  account,  we  see  how  ver>^  slender  the  evi- 
dence for  it  is.  A  man  asks  Jesus  to  raise  his  dead 
daughter  ;  without  demur  Jesus  goes  to  the  house,  quiets 
the  mourners  with  an  assurance  that  the  death  will  only 
prove  a  sleep,  and  restores  the  girl  to  life.  How  can 
any  one  possibly  maintain  that  this  story  blocks  the 
way  to  a  rejection  of  the  miracles  ?  The  storj^  is  found 
in  a  book  whose  author  we  do  not  know,  and  one  hardly 
can  ask  for  clearer  marks  of  legend  than  it  presents. 
The  only  thing  which  has  been  able  to  save  it  in  the 
past  has  been   the  life-like  details  which  Mark   has 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  1 7 1 

added,  and  these,  as  we  have  seen  and  shall  see  again, 
cannot  be  allowed  the  least  authority.  Again  there  is 
the  healing  of  the  epileptic  boy  :  the  very  feature  which 
seems  to  be  the  most  genuine,  the  despondent  words  of 
Jesus,  "  How  long  shall  I  be  with  you  ?  how  long  shall 
I  suffer  you  ?  ' '  show  how  little  the  narrative  is  to  be 
depended  on,  when  we  notice  how,  coming  after  the 
descent  from  the  Mount  of  Transfiguration,  they  point 
to  the  displeasure  which  Moses  showed  when  he  came 
down  from  the  mountain,  himself  transfigured.  But 
into  further  details  we  shall  not  go ;  if  we  have  con- 
vinced our  readers  in  the  cases  which  already  we  have 
examined  we  have  said  enough,  and  if  we  have  not 
convinced  them  it  is  useless  to  say  more. 

We  conclude  then  that  for  an  extended  healing  min- 
istry in  Jesus'  life,  for  anything,  in  fact,  more  than  an 
influence  over  demoniacs,  the  evidence  is  very  slight 
indeed.  And  with  this  also  we  rest  the  case  against 
the  miracles  as  a  whole.  We  started  by  assuming  that 
there  must  be  a  strong  presumption  against  any  narra- 
tive which  professed  to  tell  of  a  supernatural  event,  and 
that  only  the  most  unassailable  evidence  could  serve  to 
overcome  this  presumption.  Such  evidence  we  have 
not  found,  but,  quite  the  contrary',  we  have  found  the 
evidence  breaking  down  just  where  it  seemed  the 
strongest ;  we  constantly  have  come  across  the  signs 
which  ordinarily  mark  the  presence  of  legend,  and  have 
been  able  in  some  cases  to  detect  legend  in  its  growth. 
Accordingly  we  hereafter  shall  consider  ourselves  justi- 
fied in  doing  what  elsewhere  the  critic  does  not  hesitate 
to  do  without  all  this  preliminary  investigation,  and 
shall  regard  a  narrative,  when  it  tells  of  the  miracu- 
lous, as  on  the  face  of  it  in  some  sort  of  error.  We 
have  then  one  criterion  which  will  aid  most  effectually 


172       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

in  answering  the  question  which  it  will  be  convenient 
at  this  point  to  ask  in  regard  to  each  of  our  three  Gos- 
pels, What,  in  some  approximate  measure,  is  the 
degree  of  weight  which  ought  to  be  assigned  to  a 
statement  when  it  cannot  be  traced  to  the  definite  body 
of  tradition  which  has  been  called  the  source  ?  In  the 
case  of  Matthew  the  answer  to  the  question  is  very- 
easy.  The  new  matter  which  Matthew  brings  in  is  not 
only  legendary,  but  it  is  flagrantly  so.  Angels  inter- 
fere continually  and  as  a  matter  of  course  in  human 
affairs,  mysterious  stars  appear  to  guide  adoring  magi 
to  the  infant  King,  men  walk  on  the  sea,  coins  are 
found  in  fishes'  mouths,  dead  men  rise  and  appear  to 
many.  And  quite  in  the  fashion  of  legend,  too,  though 
without  the  miracle,  is  the  direct  prophecy  to  Judas, 
the  washing  of  Pilate's  hands  and  his  wife's  dream, 
the  fearful  end  of  the  traitor,  and  the  guard  at  the 
tomb.  In  one  or  two  cases  when  a  new  fact  is  intro- 
duced, the  writer  himself  shows  us  what  authority  he 
had  by  joining  an  Old  Testament  prophecy  to  it.  In- 
deed the  very  fact  that  the  Evangelist  has  so  little  that 
is  new  shows  that  he  had  no  original  source  of  infor- 
mation. When  he  wants  two  stories  to  fill  out  a  group 
of  miracles,  he  does  not  hunt  for  new  ones,  but  in  a 
slightly  mutilated  form  he  uses  two  which  he  had  before 
him  in  his  source,  and  which  he  afterwards  proceeds  to 
bring  in  again  in  their  proper  places.'  In  Luke  again, 
while  the  answer  cannot  be  given  as  absolutely  as  in 
the  case  of  the  first  Gospel,  yet  on  the  whole  the  same 
decision  must  become  to,  that  Luke's  authorities,  when 
he  leaves  his  two  main  sources,  are  not  very  reliable, 
and  that  his  narratives  at  least  have  been  a  good  deal 

'  Mat.  9  :  27-34. 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  173 

demoralized  in  the  process  of  transmission,  even  if  they 
had  any  secure  basis  at  the  start.  A  number  of  the 
narratives  already  have  had  to  be  examined  in  various 
connections,  or  will  have  to  be  :  the  rejection  at  Naza- 
reth, the  call  of  the  disciples,  the  anointing  of  Jesus 
in  the  Pharisee's  house,  the  return  of  the  seventy,  the 
story  of  the  woman  bowed  together  and  of  the  lepers, 
and  the  reply  to  the  Pharisees'  warning  against  Herod. 
Cases  of  the  same  sort  with  these  are  the  two  narra- 
tives of  the  centurion's  servant  and  of  the  widow's  son 
at  Nain.  The  first  is  a  further  development  of  a  story 
which  has  been  shown  to  be  without  foundation,  and  it 
is  not  a  very  happy  development  at  that,  for  it  takes  the 
point  from  the  centurion's  words  to  make  them  only  an 
after-thought,  and  to  put  them  in  the  mouth  of  ser- 
vants, while  the  motive  for  this  is  evident  in  a  desire  to 
increase  the  centurion's  humility.  And  the  second 
seems  to  be  an  imitation  of  the  older  raising  of  the 
dead,  although  it  goes  beyond  this  in  the  fact  that 
Jesus  makes  the  first  move  in  the  matter.  A  similar 
judgment  must  be  passed  upon  the  early  chapters  of 
the  Gospel,  which  throughout  are  pervaded  with  the 
atmosphere  of  miracle.  Quite  as  adverse  must  be  the 
decision  in  the  less  numerous  cases  where  a  statement 
must  be  assigned  to  the  author  of  the  book  himself, 
and  not  to  some  unknown  source  which  he  is  using. 
How  ready  the  author  is  to  avail  himself  of  the  right 
of  conjecture  has  appeared  in  several  instances  during 
the  discussion  of  the  Synoptic  problem,  and  these  are 
not  the  only  ones.  The  most  noticeable  instance  is  the 
way  in  which  he  brings  a  considerable  part  of  the  ma- 
terial of  his  book  into  the  last  journey  to  Jerusalem,  and 
creates  besides  a  mission  of  seventy  disciples  in  connec- 
tion with  this  journey.     Now  in  itself  this  cannot  be 


T  74      The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

called  likely,  and  indeed  Luke  finds  the  carrying  out 
of  his  program  a  clumsy  enough  task.  In  the  ninth 
chapter  the  time  for  Jesus'  death  is  almost  at  hand, 
and  he  already  has  got  as  far  as  to  Samaria,  with  his 
face  stedfastly  set  towards  Jerusalem  ;  and  in  the  tenth 
and  thirteenth  chapters  again  he  still  is  "on  the  way." 
But  in  the  thirty-first  verse  of  the  thirteenth  chapter 
he  is  back  again  in  Galilee,  and  in  the  seventeenth 
chapter  only  has  got  to  the  Samaritan  border.  More- 
over Jesus  sends  out  thirty-five  pairs  of  disciples  in 
whose  footsteps  he  is  to  follow,  a  formidable  task  at 
best,  one  might  think,  for  a  single  man.  But  instead 
of  starting  off  at  once  to  do  this,  though  already  he  has 
begun  his  journey  to  Jerusalem  and  the  days  are  well- 
nigh  come  that  he  should  be  received  up,  all  the 
seventy  have  returned  before  he  makes  another  step ; 
and  yet  from  Jesus'  charge  to  them  we  should  suppose 
that  he  anticipated  a  somewhat  lengthy  absence.  But 
it  is  needless  to  dw^ell  upon  these  difficulties,  when  we 
notice  the  material  out  of  which  L,uke  has  constructed 
his  account.  For  the  most  part  he  has  taken  a  great 
section  bodily  from  his  source,  but  in  the  source  this 
section  was  nothing  but  a  group  of  disconnected  inci- 
dents, and  Luke's  disposal  of  it  is  onl)^  a  curiously 
infelicitous  instance  of  the  way  in  which  he  constantly 
tries  to  force  his  two  authorities  into  the  same  chrono- 
logical scheme.  The  charge  to  the  Seventy,  again,  is 
precisely  the  charge  which  in  Matthew  is  given  to  the 
Twelve,  and  we  need  better  authority  than  Luke  can 
give  us  before  two  separate  events  can  be  admitted.  As 
a  matter  of  fact  Luke  seems  to  have  made  the  same 
mistake  here  which  he  makes  once  again  in  the  case  of 
the  Sabbath  cure.  In  the  source  the  charge  probably 
was  given  to  ' '  disciples, ' '  for  the  source  had  no  account 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  1 75 

of  the  calling  of  the  Twelve.  But  Mark  in  his 
abridged  account  limited  it  to  the  Twelve,  and  in  this 
Matthew  followed  him.  I^uke,  however,  because  he 
found  a  short  account  in  Mark  and  a  longer  one  in  the 
source,  got  the  idea  that  they  referred  to  different 
events,  and  it  only  was  left  for  him  to  discover  that  the 
' '  disciples ' '  were  seventy  in  number,  and  so  symbol- 
ized the  mission  to  the  nations.  This  is  perhaps  the 
most  striking  instance  which  will  be  found  in  the  book, 
but  somewhat  similar  cases  in  which  an  unfortunate 
setting  is  given  to  an  incident  are  not  infrequent. 
Such  a  case  is  the  supposition  that  the  woes  against 
the  Pharisees  were  spoken  at  table,  and  were  directed 
towards  the  host  himself,  because  he  had  expressed 
surprise  that  Jesus'  disciples  were  not  following  the 
ordinary  custom.  Such  an  occasion  lowers  Jesus' 
matchless  oratory  into  a  mere  tirade,  which  does  not 
even  keep  to  the  bounds  which  common  politeness 
would  prescribe.  Something  more  than  this  was 
needed  to  raise  Jesus  to  such  a  fierce  heat  of  indignation, 
and  the  whole  situation  seems  only  to  have  been  sug- 
gested by  the  figure  of  the  cup  and  platter,  which  was 
wholly  innocent  of  any  such  a  literal  side-reference. 
A  very  similar  case  occurs  in  the  fourteenth  chapter, 
where  a  whole  list  of  incidents  are  strung  together  as 
table-talk  at  a  Pharisee's  house.  There  is  a  possibility 
that  the  saying  about  Sabbath  healing,  before  it  was 
turned  into  a  miracle,  had  such  a  setting,  though  the 
Pharisees  who  were  interested  to  lead  Jesus  into  a  trap 
were  not  the  most  likely  to  show  hospitality  to  him  ; 
but  the  parable  of  the  supper,  as  its  connection  in 
Matthew  and  its  own  internal  character  show,  does  not 
belong  here,  and  the  discourse  about  the  chief  seat 
loses  all  its  force,  and  becomes  only  a  more  subtle  and 


I  76      The  Life  and  Teachings  of  fesus. 

eflfective  minister  to  pride,  when  it  is  turned  into  direc- 
tions literally  to  be  observed. 

There  still  remain  a  considerable  number  of  dis- 
courses which  are  peculiar  to  the  third  Gospel,  as  well 
as  a  few  historical  allusions  by  which  Luke's  accuracy 
may  be  tested,  and  these  will  be  referred  to  in  their 
proper  place.  But  of  the  historical  matter  a  pretty 
large  share  has  now  been  mentioned,  enough  to  enable 
us  to  draw  the  same  conclusion  which  was  drawn  in 
the  case  of  Matthew,  that  the  Evangelist  is  not  an 
original  authority,  and  by  himself  furnishes  no  guaran- 
tee that  he  has  got  at  the  true  facts  of  the  case,  though 
no  doubt  he  does  the  best  he  can,  and  has  no  thought 
of  creating  wrong  impressions.  When  we  turn  to 
Mark,  however,  a  case  presents  itself  which  in  a  con- 
siderable degree  diflfers  from  anything  which  we  have 
come  across  in  the  other  Gospels,  and  which  cannot  be 
settled  in  exactly  the  same  way.  Matthew  and  Luke 
do  indeed  treat  their  sources  with  great  freedom,  and 
yet  on  the  whole  they  evidently  do  not  intend  to  give 
anything  more  than  what  actually  lies  before  them, 
with  such  explanatory  notes  as  they  think  will  make 
things  plainer  to  their  readers.  They  have  apparently 
no  special  ambition  to  add  embellishments  of  their 
own,  and  what  they  do  add  is  mostly  in  the  nature  of 
conjecture,  suggested  in  the  larger  number  of  cases  by 
something  in  the  narrative  itself.  In  Mark,  however, 
this  explanation  will  not  suffice,  for  Mark  is  all  the 
time  bringing  details  for  which  there  is  no  justification 
in  the  context.  Moreover  the  greater  part  of  Mark's 
new  matter,  alike  the  stories  which  are  wholly  new, 
and  the  amplifying  details,  are  so  thoroughly  of  a 
piece,  and  so  related  to  the  general  design  of  the  book, 
that  we  hardly  can  suppose  that  he  has  got  them  from 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  177 

oral  tradition  or  from  another  written  source  ;  so  that 
we  are  left  to  face  the  dilemma  either  of  invention, 
with  perhaps  in  most  cases  some  hint  come  by  through 
tradition  as  a  starting-point,  or  else  of  a  particularly- 
wide  and  close  acquaintance  with  the  actual  facts. 
And  in  favor  of  this  last  alternative  there  can  be 
brought  forward  the  undoubted  vividness  and  life-like- 
ness of  Mark's  additions,  which  have  led  an  influential 
school  of  modern  critics  to  look  on  Mark  as  represent- 
ing a  very  old  stratum  of  tradition  indeed.  Neverthe- 
less we  are  obliged  to  reject  this  decisively.  We  have 
already  given  reasons  for  thinking  it  impossible  that 
the  author  of  the  book  should  have  got  his  facts  direct 
from  eye-witnesses  of  Jesus'  life,  and  the  more  carefully 
the  book  is  examined,  the  more  this  conclusion  will 
approve  itself.  With  all  their  verisimilitude,  the 
narratives  will  not  stand  a  careful  scrutiny.  Among 
the  instances  which  were  adduced  in  the  first 
chapter,  it  will  be  remembered  that  there  were  four 
miracle-stories  which  appeared  in  a  longer  form  in 
Mark,  and  we  showed  why,  on  critical  grounds,  we 
thought  that  Matthew's  versions  were  to  be  preferred. 
And  now,  after  the  discussion  of  the  miracles,  we  may 
add  that  the  fact  that  it  is  to  miracle-stories  that  the 
additions  have  been  made,  goes  again  to  show  that 
real  reminiscences  they  cannot  be.  And  yet  they  are 
to  the  full  as  admirable  specimens  of  the  art  of  story- 
telling as  will  be  found  anywhere  in  the  book.  And 
the  story  of  the  epileptic  boy  deserves  a  special  men- 
tion. It  is  here  that  one  of  the  sayings  comes  in 
which  would  point  to  a  healing  ministry  on  Jesus' 
part,  if  only  it  were  genuine, — "  This  kind  goeth  not 
out  save  by  prayer."  That  this  is  a  part  of  Mark's 
additions  is  shown  by  its  absence  from  the  other  Gos- 


178       The  Life  and  TeacJmigs  of  yesus. 

pels,  and  also  by  the  fact  that  the  preceding  seutence 
which  appears  in  Matthew,  "The  boy  was  healed 
from  that  hour,"  is  a  regular  formula  in  the  source  to 
mark  the  end  of  a  narrative  of  healing.  The  same 
objection  also,  that  the}^  tell  of  miracles,  will  condemn 
several  other  stories  which  are  due  to  Mark  entire. 
The  cursing  of  the  fig-tree  and  the  walking  on  the 
sea  have  been  discussed  already,  and  besides  these  is 
the.  cure  of  blind  Bartimaeus,  and  the  cures  of  a  deaf 
man  and  a  blind  man  in  the  seventh  and  eighth  chap- 
ters. These,  all  of  them,  show  Mark's  dexterous 
touch  most  distinctly  in  the  minuteness  with  which 
they  enter  into  details,  and  the  last  two  should  be 
noticed  in  particular.  These  introduce  a  touch  which 
is  quite  anomalous,  and  represent  Jesus'  cures  as  medi- 
ated through  phj'sical  means.  If  we  take  these  nar- 
ratives seriously,  and  try  to  find  an  explanation  for 
them,  we  shall  only  have  our  labor  for  our  pains. 
Suppose  we  take  the  case  of  the  blind  man  :  Jesus 
spits  on  his  eyes  and  effects  a  partial  cure,  and  then 
a  second  application  completes  the  process.  But  apart 
from  the  fact  that  this  is  an  isolated  case,  why  any- 
way should  Jesus  have  used  spittle  ?  Of  course,  in  no 
case  could  the  spittle  have  done  good,  so  what  was  to 
be  gained  by  such  a  sham  ?  If  one  says  it  was  to  in- 
crease the  blind  man's  faith,  this  may  mean  either  of 
two  things.  If  it  means  that  faith,  or  mental  confi- 
dence, was  the  effective  instrtmient  of  the  cure,  then 
at  least  it  does  away  with  the  need  of  a  miracle.  But 
a  faith  cure  in  such  a  case  is  barely  possible,  and  the 
confidence  with  which  Jesus  goes  to  work,  as  well  as 
the  success  he  meets  with,  is  strange  enough.  If, 
however,  one  means  faith  in  the  higher  sense,  and 
supposes  that  this  b}'-play  was  just  to  keep  the  mira- 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  1 79 

cle  from  being  morally  unfruitful,  then  nothing  is 
explained  after  all ;  for  it  is  not  easy  to  see  how  a  par- 
tial miracle  caused  by  spittle  would  be  likely  to  beget 
truer  faith  than  a  complete  miracle  effected  by  a  word. 
In  truth,  the  thing  would  be  hard  to  solve  on  any 
terms,  if  it  were  not  in  Mark  that  it  was  found  ;  but 
if  Mark  has  gone  to  work  as  we  contend  he  has,  then 
this  is  nothing  but  another  example  of  the  concrete,  pal- 
pable, minute  way,  in  which  he  loves  to  bring  before 
himself  every  detail  which  will  make  an  incident  more 
real. 

And  another  point  against  Mark's  pictures  is  the 
way  in  which,  to  form  them,  he  brings  details  to- 
gether out  of  his  written  sources.  Nearly  all  of  his 
discourses  he  has  made  up  in  this  way,  by  joining 
passages  together  which  seemed  to  afford  a  pretty  good 
connection  ;  and  sometimes  in  his  history  he  has  fol- 
lowed the  same  plan.  The  best  example  of  this  is  in 
the  sketch  with  which  he  opens  Jesus'  ministry.  We 
have  shown  already  how  Jesus'  words  are  borrowed 
from  the  Baptist,  how  the  miracle  in  the  sjmagogue  is 
taken  from  another  connection,  how  the  phraseology 
depends  continally  upon  the  source.  With  what  con- 
fidence can  we  rely  upon  such  a  piece  of  patchwork, 
however  cleverly  it  is  put  together,  as  a  true  ac- 
count ?  or  what  likelihood  is  there  that  an  au- 
thor w^ho  was  forced  to  use  such  methods  had  rich 
stores  of  good  information  within  his  reach  ?  And 
there  is,  besides,  against  this  sketch,  the  fact  that  it 
makes  Jesus  start  in  at  once  on  a  general  healing 
ministry,  and  the  fact  that  it  has  a  wrong  idea  of  what 
the  real  nature  of  Jesus'  teaching  was.  No  doubt  it 
adds  to  the  picturesqueness  of  the  scene,  and  gives  an 
incisiveness  to  the  delineation,   to  represent  Jesus  as 


i8o      The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 


starting  on  his  work  with  so  much  vim,  rushing  from 
town  to  town,  with  time  only  for  a  day  in  the  largest. 
But  as  a  real  fact  Jesus  was  not  in  such  a  hurrj-  as  this, 
and  if  he  had  been  it  would  have  played  havoc  with 
all  his  plans.  Even  if  his  thought  had  been  just  to 
put  himself  before  the  people  as  Messiah,  he  could  not 
have  gained  this  by  a  hurried  proclamation  simply  ; 
but  really  his  aims  w^ere  far  deeper  than  this,  as  we 
shall  see,  and  could  be  carried  out  only  by  patient  and 
continued  effort.  And  another  case  may  be  noticed  in 
this  connection,  because  it  has  a  saying  that  refers  to 
miracles  connected  with  it.  In  the  ninth  chapter  there 
are  two  incidents  related,  the  dispute  about  precedence 
and  the  account  of  a  man  who  cast  out  demons  in 
Jesus'  name,  and  there  is,  besides,  a  long  discourse 
joined  with  them.  But  the  parts  of  this  discourse — 
almost  all  of  them — are  taken  out  of  other  connections  ; 
there  is  another  dispute  about  precedence  where  the 
accompanying  discourse  is  far  more  genuine  ;  and 
Jesus'  reply  to  John's  complaint  is  only  a  transforma- 
tion of  a  better  attested  saying,  ' '  He  that  is  not  for  us 
is  against  us  "  :  so  that  there  really  remains  nothing, 
except  possibly  one  aphorism  by  Jesus,  upon  which  one 
can  lay  his  hand  securely  as  a  token  of  real  knowledge. 
And  one  other  strong  indication  against  the  relia- 
bility of  Mark's  statements  still  remains  in  the  fact  that 
a  good  share  of  them  are  connected  more  or  less  closely 
with  the  dramatic  framework  in  which  Jesus'  life  is 
set.  We  have  noticed  some  of  the  elements  of  this 
already,  and  now  that,  along  with  the  paucity  of  new 
information  in  other  directions,  Mark  should  3'et  have 
possessed  such  an  abundance  of  reliable  intelligence  on 
a  very  few  unimportant  points,  for  instance  that  he 
should  have  had  such  graphic  knowledge  of  the  crowds 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  1 8 1 

about  Jesus  and  the  sick  people  who  were  healed  on  so 
many  different  occasions,  passes  credence,  and  is  a  clear 
indication  of  the  way  in  which  these  picturesque  de- 
tails should  be  received.  The  repeated  prophecies  of 
coming  death,  largely  in  the  same  words,  are  another 
instance  of  the  sort,  and  so  too  are  the  numerous 
notices  which  centre  about  Mark's  idea  of  Jesus'  Mes- 
siahship  and  its  acknowledgment.  This  last  may  be 
noticed  because  it  accounts  for  a  fact  which  often  has 
been  brought  up  as  proof  for  the  reality  of  the  mira- 
cles, that  Jesus  sometimes  forbids  the  miracle  to  be 
reported.  The  truth  however  seems  to  be  that  this  is 
due  to  Mark,  who,  with  his  conception  of  Jesus'  Mes- 
siahship  as  hidden  from  the  people  by  reason  of  their 
unbelief,  makes  use  of  it,  now  to  keep  demons  from 
making  known  the  fact,  and  now  to  restrict  the  spread 
of  some  particularly  marvellous  deed  of  power.  It 
may  be  thought  that  also  it  is  meant  to  serve  for 
heightening  the  impression  of  Jesus'  popularity,  for 
there  often  is  joined  to  it  a  notice  that  it  proved  of  no 
avail,  and  that  the  crowds  only  thronged  about  Jesus 
the  more.  But  apart  from  these  more  patent  cases,  two 
other  instances,  less  obvious,  may  be  pointed  out  in 
which  the  author's  desire  to  give  dramatic  movement 
to  his  story  has  dominated  the  use  of  his  material. 
One  is  the  way  in  which  he  depicts  the  growth  of  the 
hostility  against  Jesus,  and  more  particularly  two 
incidents  which  he  gives  with  this  aim  in  view.  In 
the  third  chapter  he  tells  how  the  enmity  of  the  Phari- 
sees reaches  such  a  height  that  they  resolve  to  make 
away  with  Jesus,  if  it  lies  within  their  power  ;  and  for 
this  purpose  they  even  are  ready  to  join  hands  with  the 
Herodians.  How  much  reliance  can  be  placed  upon 
this  very  definite  statement  will  appear  from  the  fact 


1 82       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 


that  the  occasion  for  it  is  found  in  the  heahng  on  the 
Sabbath  day,  and  we  have  seen  that  this  cure  never 
occurred  at  all.  Mark  then  clearly  in  this  place  has 
transformed  a  miracle  which  he  found  before  him,  to 
adapt  it  better  to  his  purpose,  and  then  has  made  it  a 
marked  point  in  the  drama  which  he  is  constructing 
and  has  connected  a  definite  statement  with  it,  entirely, 
it  would  seem,  under  the  guidance  of  his  own  sense  of 
fitness.  And  closely  connected  with  this  there  is  an- 
other incident  which  is  even  more  elaborate,  the  inci- 
dent on  the  lake  when  the  disciples  forget  to  take 
bread.  The  saying  about  leaven,  which  the  other 
Evangelists  misunderstand,  has,  as  Mark  shows,  a  di- 
rect reference  back  to  this  same  statement  which  is 
made  in  connection  with  the  Sabbath  healing.  But  if 
the  motive  for  the  incident  is  swept  away,  then  it  is 
dangerous  of  course  to  hold  on  to  the  incident  itself, 
and  not  less  dangerous  when  we  notice  how  gross  the 
disciples'  mistake  is  for  a  real  mistake,  and  how  the 
stor)'  goes  on  to  imply  the  two  miracles  of  feeding, 
which  are  in  the  last  degree  doubtful.  Again  there- 
fore we  are  led  back  to  the  same  explanation,  which 
we  might  indeed  hesitate  to  apply  if  there  were  not  so 
many  other  cases  which  called  for  it  as  well,  that  Mark 
has  not  scrupled  to  construct  a  story  when  he  needed 
it  to  give  completeness  to  his  picture. 

And  this  appears  again  in  a  way  which  perhaps  is 
still  more  striking.  We  have  seen  already  that  Luke's 
account  of  the  visit  to  Nazareth  is  not  to  be  depended 
on,  and  for  that  matter  hardly  more  is  Mark's  account. 
We  do  not  mean  to  doubt  the  fact  that  Jesus  failed  to 
find  belief  among  his  fellow-townsmen,  which  may  all 
be  true,  but  only  to  doubt  whether  Mark  had  any  suffi- 
cient information  ou  which  to  base  his  narrative.     This 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  183 

must  be  considered  improbable,  because  for  one  thing 
his  story  is  filled  so  with  the  presupposition  of  the 
miracles,  although  the  fact  of  a  rejection  he  may  pos- 
sibly have  had  to  go  on.  What,  however,  we  are  after 
is  not  to  disprove  this  narrative  so  much  as  to  point 
out  again  the  dramatic  completeness  which  is  charac- 
teristic of  Mark.  ' '  A  prophet  is  not  without  honor, 
save  in  his  own  country,  and  among  his  own  kin,  and 
in  his  own  house, "  is  a  proverbial  saying  which  may 
or  may  not  have  been  spoken  by  Jesus,  but  which  at 
least  is  of  special  interest  to  Mark.  For  this  narrative 
is  only  the  climax  of  a  series,  and  already  he  has  shown 
how  Jesus  suffered  from  unbelief  among  his  own  kins- 
men, and  in  his  own  house,  in  the  third  chapter  of  his 
book.  These  incidents  have  played  some  part  in  the 
theories  of  German  critics,  and  curious  results  have 
been  the  outcome  of  them  ;  yet  they  will  not  stand  a 
searching  criticism.  Jesus,  we  are  told,  returns  home, 
and  at  once  has  such  a  crowd  about  him  that  he  gets 
no  chance  so  much  as  to  eat.  His  kinsmen  thereupon 
give  it  out  that  he  is  beside  himself,  and  it  is  this  which 
suggests  to  the  Pharisees  a  way  of  accounting  for 
Jesus'  cures.  Then  Jesus'  mother  and  brethren  ap- 
pear on  the  scene  and  try  in  vain  to  get  at  him  through 
the  crowd,  and  this  is  connected  closely  with  the  accusa- 
tion of  insanity.  Jesus  resents  their  interference,  and 
rebukes  them.  Now  here  again  there  is  the  suspicious 
fact  that  the  whole  story  is  one  of  Mark's  numerous 
attempts  to  picture  graphically  the  great  popularity  of 
Jesus,  and  the  enormous  crowds  which  thronged  about 
him,  and  there  is  nothing  to  show  that  he  had  any  his- 
torical warrant  for  this  in  the  matter  of  definite  details. 
And  then  again  the  accusation  by  the  Pharisees,  which 
is  taken  from  Mark's  source,  really  arose  in  an  en- 


184      The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

tirely  diflferent  waj',  and  there  is  not  the  least  prob- 
ability in  connecting  it  with  anything  that  Jesus'  kins- 
men may  have  said.  On  the  contrary,  the  charge  made 
by  the  Pharisees  seems  to  have  been  what  suggested 
this  other  charge  to  Mark.  And  furthermore  it  is 
only  by  shutting  one's  eyes  resolutel)'  to  the  context 
that  one  can  refuse  to  see  a  sharp  rebuke  in  Jesus' 
words,  and  such  a  rebuke  directed  to  his  mother  we 
should  be  a  little  loth  to  admit.  But  the  whole  thing 
gives  no  difficulty  if  we  will  recognize  what  we  have 
tried  to  show  by  cumulative  proof,  that  Mark  in  his 
descriptions  has  let  his  imagination  have  full  play. 
Certainly  where  legend  works  at  all,  as  legend  cer- 
tainly does  work  in  the  Gospels,  imagination  contin- 
ually must  come  in,  and  it  is  no  harder  to  admit  that 
it  comes  in  at  this  particular  point,  than  that  to  some 
one  else  was  due  the  details  which  the  Gospel  writer 
simply  copied  as  he  found  them. 

And  where  then,  some  may  ask  in  real  perplexity, 
are  we  to  find  the  materials  which  will  help  us  to  make 
out  the  true  story  of  Jesus'  life,  if  his  biographers  are 
not  to  be  depended  on,  and  if  legend  throws  a  dark 
mist  over  everything  which  we  would  fain  look  to  for 
light.  Now  we  are  not  responsible  for  the  facts  in  the 
case.  We  should  rejoice  as  much  as  any  one  if  there 
were  full  and  unmistakable  knowledge  which  would 
bring  before  us  every  phase  of  Jesus'  life.  But  if  the 
knowledge  is  not  there,  it  will  not  better  things  to  pre- 
tend we  have  it,  and  to  refuse  to  give  up  any  scrap  of 
information  after  its  baselessness  has  appeared,  just  be- 
cause we  have  nothing  else  to  take  its  place.  It  is  true 
that  a  large  part,  yes,  a  very  large  part  indeed  of  all 
we  seemed  to  know  about  Jesus  has  crumbled  away, 
and  it  naturally  is  with  regret  that  we  see  it  fall.     But 


The  Credibility  of  the  Gospels.  185 

fall  it  must,  and  all  we  can  do  is  to  go  cheerfully  to 
work,  and  see  if  enough  is  not  still  left  to  restore  the 
picture,  which  seems  on  the  point  of  fading  away,  to 
something  of  its  former  brightness,  perhaps  to  a  glory 
that  shall  eclipse  the  old.  It  is  to  this  task  that  we 
shall  now  address  ourselves. 


PART  II.— THE  LIFE  AND  TEACHINGS  OF 
JESUS. 


CHAPTER  I. 

THE  PRKPARATION. 

THE  early  life  of  Jesus  is  wrapped  in  an  obscurity 
which  we  can  never  hope  will  grow  any  less  dark 
and  impenetrable  than  it  is  at  the  present. 
Apart  from  what  we  can  say  of  any  Jewish  child,  and 
from  a  few  guesses  to  which  later  events  give-  a  certain 
probability,  there  are  barely  two  or  three  facts  about 
him  which  dimly  can  be  descried  in  the  shadowy  back- 
ground by  which  poetic  legend  and  religious  faith  have 
striven  with  loving  pains  to  fill  up  the  broken  outlines 
of  the  Master's  life.  For  any  hope  that  out  of  the 
stories  in  the  early  chapters  of  the  Gospels,  beautiful 
as  some  of  them  undoubtedly  are,  anything  of  value 
can  be  disentangled  for  the  real  history  of  Jesus'  life, 
will  end  in  disappointment.  It  would  be  a  waste  of 
time  for  us  to  criticise  the  narratives  at  length,  because 
one's  bearing  towards  them  is  determined  already  by 
his  bearing  towards  the  Gospels  as  a  whole.  They  are 
in  the  latest  stratum  of  the  Gospel  literature,  and  by 

187 


1 88      The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

themselves  they  furnish  no  weapon  for  their  own  de- 
fence. If  the  other  parts  of  the  Gospels,  and  so  the 
miraculous  in  general,  once  were  firmly  established, 
then  the  stories  of  the  early  life  might  be  allowed  to 
stand  under  their  protection  ;  but  failing  this  they  have 
nothing  that  can  be  said  for  them. 

According  to  the  Gospels  Jesus  was  bom  in  Bethle- 
hem of  Judaea,  the  city  of  David  ;  but  this  statement 
is  bound  up  so  closely  with  the  assumption  that  it  was 
in  Bethlehem  that  the  Messiah  must  be  born,  that  it 
loses  a  great  share  of  its  value.  It  is  more  likely  that 
Nazareth  in  Galilee  is  to  be  assigned  the  honor,  for  at 
least  it  was  at  Nazareth  that  Jesus  spent  his  early  life. 
Joseph,  his  father,  is  usually  agreed  to  have  been  a 
carpenter  ;  and  while  in  reality  it  is  Jesus  who  is  called 
the  carpenter  in  the  more  original  account,  and  while 
this  account  itself  is  not  a  very  early  or  reliable  one, 
yet  the  statement  may  be  allowed  to  stand.  The  tra- 
dition that  Jesus  was  of  the  family  of  David  is  rather 
more  uncertain,  because  it  has  so  evident  a  motive  in 
his  Messiahship  ;  but  since  it  was  accepted  by  men  like 
Paul,  who  had  an  opportunity  to  know  the  truth,  it 
may  after  all  be  thought  to  be  not  unlikely.  More 
doubtful  still  is  the  time  of  Jesus'  birth.  As  two  in- 
dependent traditions  put  it  in  the  reign  of  Herod  we  per- 
haps may  accept  this  as  having  some  real  basis,  but  any 
attempt  to  fix  the  date  more  closely,  by  relying  on 
apocryphal  stars  or  even  upon  such  definite  statements 
as  are  made  by  Luke,  will  only  be  a  waste  of  inge- 
nuity. For  if  in  the  rest  of  the  book  L,uke  shows  that 
he  has  no  independent  knowledge  of  Jesus'  ministry, 
it  is  unlikely,  when  he  goes  still  further  back,  that  his 
calculations  of  chronology  can  be  relied  on  ;  and  the 
desperate  methods  which  have  to  be  employed  to  free 


The  Preparation.  189 


him  from  the  charge  of  proven  error  do  not  prepossess 
one  in  his  favor.  We  must  be  content  to  say  we  do 
not  know. 

Fancy  will  always  love  to  dwell  with  the  boy  Jesus 
on  the  slopes  of  the  Galilean  hills,  and  watch  the  un- 
folding of  that  mind  and  character  which  were  to  work 
such  a  mighty  revolution  in  the  world  of  thought  and 
action.  A  quiet  boy  he  must  have  been,  a  little  shy 
perhaps,  full  of  genuine  human  sympathy  and  with  a 
heart  quickly  touched,  a  genial  friend  and  comrade, 
but  fond,  too,  of  the  fields  and  watercourses,  where 
he  could  muse  without  hindrance  over  Israel's  great 
past  and  greater  future  and  over  Israel's  God,  and 
have  quiet  and  free  play  for  the  struggling  thoughts 
and  emotions  which  came  thronging  to  his  brain. 
Then  there  was  the  home  teaching  in  the  Law  to  oc- 
cupy him,  and  the  synagogue  worship,  with  its  sacred 
associations,  and  talks  with  neighbors  and  acquaint- 
ances, perhaps,  from  time  to  time,  with  some  pious 
lawyer  or  Pharisee,  about  the  Law  and  the  hope  of 
Israel.  And  most  of  all  there  was  the  Book  of  the  Law 
itself,  and  all  the  treasures  of  sacred  psalm  and  story 
and  prophecy,  over  which  Jesus  had  pored  till  he  had 
mastered  the  fulness  of  the  revelation  which  it  had  to 
give.  To  the  Law  and  to  Jesus'  own  supreme  genius 
and  insight,  all  that  is  most  characteristic  in  his  after- 
teaching  seems  to  have  been  due.  No  doubt,  with  his 
keen  vision  for  the  things  and  the  men  about  him,  he 
made  himself  familiar  with  all  the  phases  of  religious 
life  and  thought  which  were  influencing  his  country- 
men, but  no  one  phase  predominates  over  the  rest,  so 
that  we  can  say,  without  hesitation,  This  was  taken 
from  such  and  such  a  source.  Jesus  is  no  Pharisee  or 
Essene  ;  the  liberalism  of  Alexandria  is  not  Jesus'  lib- 


IQO      The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

eralism.  What  is  good  he  takes  from  any  source,  but 
all  has  been  so  fused  together  and  transformed  by  his 
own  genius  that  it  becomes  a  new  thing  in  the  process. 
It  could  not  be  long  before  Jesus  would  begin  vaguely 
to  feel  that  from  those  about  him  he  already  had  got  the 
most  they  had  to  give  him.  For  Judaism  there  was  one 
sufficient  answer  to  all  religious  questions,  and  that 
answer  was — Authority.  It  is  one  of  the  most  strik- 
ing elements  of  Jesus'  genius  that,  in  the  midst  of  this 
stagnation  of  the  human  mind,  when  thought  was 
chained  to  the  pettj'  treadmill  of  logical  and  grammati- 
cal inference,  he  j'et  was  forced  to  ask  the  question — 
Why  ?  And  what  had  Judaism  in  the  way  of  answer  ? 
Because  it  is  written,  because  the  Elders  have  said,  be- 
cause this  is  Rabbi  So-and-so's  opinion, — all  most  ex- 
cellent reasons  to  the  ordinarj^  Jew,  but  not  the  sort  of 
thing  to  satisfy  Jesus.  Something  better  he  must  have 
than  this,  something  to  bring  him  closer  into  the  presence 
of  the  God  and  Father  who  every  day  was  becoming 
more  to  him,  something  worthy  of  God  and  of  the 
manhood  to  which  God  revealed  himself.  More  and 
more  Jesus  would  find  that  he  was  forced  back  upon 
his  own  thinking,  and  upon  the  book  in  which  already 
he  had  found  something  of  the  freedom  which  Juda- 
ism so  signally  was  lacking  in  ;  and  with  the  book 
open  before  him,  and  an  eye  keen  to  catch  every  gleam 
of  what  was  kindred  to  his  own  half-conscious  crav- 
ings, the  religious  heroes  of  his  boyhood  could  not 
fail  before  much  time  had  passed  to  lose  a  good  deal 
of  the  glamour  which  still  surrounded  them  in  the  eyes 
of  the  people  as  a  whole.  And  in  truth  they  were  not 
very  heroic  figures  when  one  had  got  used  to  the  glare 
of  their  somewhat  pretentious  piety,  and  recovered  him- 
self a  little  from  the  first  shock  of  awe.     Was  it,  after 


The  Preparation.  191 

all,  the  highest  duty  of  man  to  wash  his  hands  before 
meals,  and  keep  from  eating  eggs  laid  on  the  Sabbath  ? 
Had  God  thundered  on  Sinai  and  led  his  children 
through  fightings  and  perils  of  every  kind  just  for 
this,  that  they  should  spend  their  lives  in  avoiding  the 
touch  of  half  of  God's  creation,  and  then  in  purifying 
themselves  when  their  painstaking  had  been  without 
avail  ?  Was  God  no  more  than  a  particularly  strict 
Rabbi,  on  a  larger  scale,  and  man  no  better  than  a  use- 
less drudge,  a  slave  to  a  code  of  rules  which  led  no- 
where and  which  had  no  meaning  to  an)'  one  ?  No  ; 
to  Jesus,  as  to  all  the  nobler  spirits  in  the  nation,  it 
must  appear  that  men  were  meant  for  far  greater 
things  than  this  ;  but  while  others  were  content  to  let 
the  two  conceptions  stand  side  by  side,  Jesus  must 
needs  ask  himself  what  their  relation  was.  And  Jesus 
was  no  more  satisfied  with  the  popular  and  patriotic 
ideal.  The  need  of  his  people  stood  before  him  as  a 
very  patent  fact,  and  it  met  a  quick  response  in  his 
large  human  sympathy.  But  could  this  need  be  met, 
as  the  zealots  of  his  people  whispered,  by  throwing  off 
the  Roman  yoke  and  proclaiming  the  independence  of 
the  nation  ?  and  would  it  be  much  different  if  a  con- 
queror should  come  from  on  high  with  supernatural 
power,  and  set  up,  not  a  kingdom  founded  on  the  right 
relation  of  the  individual  man  to  God,  which  Jesus' 
own  experience  was  leading  him  to  see  was  after  all 
the  source  of  the  truest  blessedness,  but  an  external 
kingdom  that  never  should  be  moved  ? 

How  long  it  took  for  Jesus  to  answer  these  ques- 
tions, and  to  come  to  the  position  of  calm  certainty  in 
which  afterwards  we  find  him,  it  is  not  possible  for  us 
to  say.  Probably  the  process  was  a  gradual  one,  for 
Jesus  was  too  profoundly  sensitive  to  religion  to  throw 


I  92      The  Life  and  Teachings  of  yesus. 

off  lightly  what  came  to  him  with  the  odor  of  sanctity- 
clinging  to  it ;  and  besides,  the  external  influences 
which  could  help  him  were  very  few.  But  he  did 
reach  the  answer,  which  is  the  main  thing,  and  proba- 
bly the  matter  already  lay  pretty  clearly  in  his  mind 
when  the  nation  was  startled  by  the  announcement 
that  a  new  prophet  had  arisen.  A  new  prophet !  it 
was  this  that  for  centuries  now  the  pious  Jew  had  been 
anxiously  desiring  and  looking  forward  to, — a  token 
that  God's  presence  still  was  with  the  nation  ;  and  one 
can  imagine  the  thrill  which  stirred  every  village 
where  the  news  was  told.  And  the  hopes  of  the 
people  were  not  disappointed.  It  is  little  enough  that 
we  can  say  of  John  to-day,  and  3'et,  even  apart  from 
Jesus'  magnificent  eulogy,  the  few  words  of  his  which 
have  come  down  to  us  are  sufl&cient  to  stamp  him  at 
once  as  a  man  of  genuine  and  unmistakable  power,  one 
of  the  heroic  type  of  mankind,  on  whom  the  eye  of 
Jesus  could  well  rest  with  genuine  satisfaction,  and 
whom  he  could  hold  up  with  something  like  scorn  along- 
side the  t3^pical  Galilean,  fickle  and  unreliable,  or  the 
effeminate  and  luxurious  Herodian  courtier.  Without 
originality  in  the  highest  sense,  deficient  in  his  range 
of  vision  and  in  his  sj-mpathies,  not  possessed  of  the 
catholicity  and  tolerance  which  indeed  were  hardly  to 
be  looked  for  in  a  Jew  of  his  time,  he  yet  was  filled 
with  such  a  terrible  earnestness  and  such  an  over- 
whelming sense  of  the  pre-eminent  value  of  righteous- 
ness, that  he  would  have  been  called  great  in  any  age. 
Indeed  he  was  a  true  successor  to  the  older  and  greater 
prophets,  possessed,  like  them,  of  one  supreme  idea, 
and  striking  sledge-hammer  blows  in  its  behalf,  utterly 
careless  of  the  opposition  and  hatred  he  might  draw 
upon  himself.     The  degradation  and  hypocrisy  of  the 


The  Preparation.  193 

nation  filled  him  with  immeasurable  disgust ;  surely 
the  promised  presence  of  Jehovah  could  not  be  long 
delayed  to  do  away  utterly  with  such  unworthiness. 
The  lurid  light  of  avenging  fire  and  coming  wrath  fills 
his  preaching.  No  fancied  security  from  their  father 
Abraham  will  serve  them,  nothing  except  repentance 
and  righteousness.  Already  the  axe  is  laid  to  the  root 
of  the  trees,  the  time  is  short :  repent,  for  the  kingdom 
and  its  Messiah  are  at  hand,  not  only  with  the  bless- 
ings you  are  expecting,  but  with  woes  as  well  for  those 
who  are  not  prepared  for  him. 

Naturally  enough,  the  leaders  of  the  nation  did  not 
greatly  relish  John's  preaching.  It  was  not  pleasant 
to  be  told  that  they  themselves  had  been  so  conspicu- 
ously a  failure,  and  doubtless,  too,  John's  insistence 
upon  righteousness  alone  seemed  to  them  dangerous, 
and  not  to  recognize  sufficiently  the  great  duty  of 
obedience  to  the  Law,  and  its  ritual.  They  had  no  sym- 
pathy with  such  heresy,  and  they  called  him  a  fanatic, 
a  man  with  a  demon.  To  the  people,  however,  John's 
preaching  appealed  powerfully,  and  especially  the  more 
despised  classes,  the  publicans  and  harlots,  turned 
eagerly  to  him.  Crowds  flocked  to  hear  him  preach 
and  to  submit  to  the  simple  rite  by  which  he  tried  to 
symbolize  and  drive  hard  home  the  change  of  life  and 
purpose  which  he  called  for.  But  to  one  man  the  re- 
port of  John's  preaching  had  come  with  a  special  sig- 
nificance. It  may  be  that  Jesus  already  had  reached 
the  complete  conception  of  what  his  life-work  was  to 
be,  and  yet  it  is  quite  possible  that  John's  appearance 
furnished  just  the  impetus  which  caused  his  purposes 
to  crystallize  and  take  on  definite  form.  At  last  Jesus 
had  come  to  see  clearly  what  the  gift  was  that  God 
had  in  store  for  his  people,  and  how  wofully  inade- 


1 94      The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

quate  were  the  old  ideals ;  and  his  heart  bled  for  the 
men  about  him,  who  were  groping  blindly  after  what 
they  never  could  attain,  and  what,  if  attained,  would 
bring  no  satisfaction  with  it,  while  the  true  blessings 
lay  right  within  their  reach.  And  the  fact  that  he  was 
not  alone,  but  that  one  other  man  at  least  within  the 
nation  had  seen  the  same  thing,  even  though  less 
clearly  than  himself,  and  had  dared  to  come  out  and 
speak  the  truth  that  he  had  seen,  must  have  inspired 
him  with  fresh  courage.  And  what  of  that  other  prom- 
ise which  John  had  made  ?  Was  it  indeed  true  that 
God  was  about  to  visit  his  people,  and  that  his  chosen 
one  was  close  at  hand.  And  then,  it  may  be  in  a  flash 
of  insight,  or  perhaps  by  slow  degrees,  the  knowledge 
would  come  to  him  that  he,  who  alone  had  experienced 
the  full  blessedness  of  the  kingdom,  and  who  alone 
saw  wherein  in  truth  it  consisted,  was  by  this  very 
fact  marked  out  as  the  Messiah,  the  one  who  should 
bring  home  to  the  nation  the  truth  which  he  had  real- 
ized in  himself  and  which  would  place  in  their  posses- 
sion all  the  blessedness  that  God  had  promised. 

It  is  an  interesting  question  whether  John  ever  rec- 
ognized in  Jesus  the  one  whom  he  had  come  to  an- 
nounce. The  view  which  is  based  upon  the  Fourth 
Gospel,  that  John  had  recognized  Jesus  and  openly  had 
testified  to  him,  it  will  be  necessary  to  give  up,  for  in 
that  case  Jesus'  Messiahship  must  early  have  been 
known  among  the  people.  It  seems,  too,  definitely  to 
be  set  aside  by  Jesus'  own  words,  which  speak  of  John 
as  still  outside  the  kingdom.  There  is  indeed  much  to 
be  said  for  the  opposing  view  that  it  was  only  after  his 
imprisonment  that  John  came  to  think  of  Jesus  in  this 
light,  and  that  the  question  which  he  sent  from  the 
prison   shows   the  first  dawning  of  belief.      Perhaps 


The  Preparation.  195 

there  is  really  not  enough  data  for  us  to  go  upon,  and 
yet  to  us  it  seems  that  this  view  hardly  accounts  for 
everything  in  the  Gospels.  It  is  in  itself  rather  proba- 
ble that  Jesus  should  have  been  acquainted  with  John  ; 
it  is  not  likely  that  the  two  men  whose  aims  at  bot- 
tom were  the  same  should  have  kept  wholly  apart. 
Then  we  have,  too,  the  evidence  that  Jesus  took  ad- 
vantage of  John's  baptism  to  dedicate  himself  to  the 
new  work  on  which  he  had  resolved.  It  is  true  that 
the  narrative  which  tells  of  this  cannot  be  accepted. 
This  narrative  seems  to  have  been  due  more  immedi- 
ately to  the  passage  which  is  quoted  in  the  twelfth 
chapter  of  Matthew:  "Behold  m}^  servant,  whom  I 
have  chosen,"  runs  Matthew's  somewhat  corrupt  ver- 
sion, "  my  beloved,  in  whom  my  soul  is  well  pleased. 
I  will  put  my  spirit  upon  him,  and  he  shall  declare 
judgment  to  the  Gentiles."  And  accordingly,  in  the 
story  of  the  baptism  we  read  how  the  Spirit  came  upon 
Jesus  at  the  opening  of  his  ministry,  and  how  a  voice 
came  from  heaven,  "  Thou  art  7ny  beloved  son,  in  whom 
I  am  well  pleased.'^  Nevertheless,  the  fact  itself  is 
hardly  to  be  rejected,  because  it  is  a  fact  of  such  a  sort 
that  tradition  would  be  less  likely  to  invent  it  than  to 
take  offence  at  it,  as  Matthew  seems  already  to  have 
done.  Moreover,  we  find  Jesus  in  several  passages 
showing  a  somewhat  intimate  knowledge  of  the  Bap- 
tist, and  this  would  suggest  that  he  had  come  into 
close  contact  with  him.  And  the  very  form  of  the 
question  which  John  asks,  if  it  be  genuine,  im- 
plies a  former  acquaintanceship.  If  the  thought 
had  been  a  new  one  to  John,  he  would  have  asked, 
' '  Art  thou  the  coming  one  ?  ' '  but  he  hardly  would 
have  added  "or  do  we  look  for  another ?  ' '  These 
added    words    point    to    somewhat    different    circum- 


196      The  Life  and  Teachings  of  jfesus. 

stances,  and  the  circumstances  to  which  they  point 
seem  to  us  to  be  these.  There  is  nothing  to  show  that 
John,  with  all  his  profound  sense  of  the  necessity  of 
conduct,  was  yet  able  to  lift  himself  out  of  the  atmos- 
phere of  externality  which  clung  to  the  whole  Jewish 
scheme  of  belief  about  divine  things.  His  Messiah, 
for  example,  is  a  Messiah  whose  functions  are  insepa- 
rably connected  with  righteousness,  and  yet  his  influ- 
ence is  after  all  outward  and  supernatural.  Sin  is 
overthrown  by  destroying  the  sinner,  righteousness  is 
promoted  by  the  setting  up  of  the  direct  rule  of  God 
through  his  representative.  The  conception  of  God's 
relation  to  man  as  solel}'  a  spiritual  thing  within  the 
man  himself,  John  was  not  able  to  reach  ;  he  was  too 
impatient  to  wait  for  the  kingdom  of  righteousness  to 
come  about  by  natural  growth,  but  must  have  it  estab- 
lished at  one  blow.  It  only  can  have  been  some  such 
far-reaching  diflference  as  this  between  the  two  concep- 
tions which  Jesus  had  in  mind  when  he  spoke  of  John 
as  still  outside  the  kingdom,  and,  with  all  his  magnifi- 
cent achievement,  less  than  the  little  ones  who  really 
had  mastered  the  idea  of  Jesus.  Now  if  Jesus  had 
known  John  he  must  have  talked  with  him  about  the 
kingdom  and  have  tried  to  show  John  his  own  concep- 
tion of  it ;  and  his  Messiahship,  if  he  had  spoken  of  it 
at  all,  he  only  could  have  spoken  of  hypothetically 
in  this  connection  ;  and  perhaps  even  Jesus  at  that 
time,  was  not  fully  assured  of  his  mission,  and  as 
yet  had  only  a  growing  belief  in  it.  If,  then,  we  think 
of  conversations  in  which  Jesus'  Messiahship,  in  con- 
nection with  his  new  view  of  the  kingdom,  had  been 
spoken  of  tentatively,  and  had  been  recognized  as  a  pos- 
sibility, John's  question  becomes  somewhat  more  natu- 
ral.    Art  thou,  he  asks  of  Jesus,  the  coming  one,  as 


The  Preparation.  197 

once  we  thought  it  possible  of  thee  ?  or  after  all  must 
we  wait  for  another  ?  And  the  answer  which  Jesus 
makes  to  John,  this  also  becomes  plain.  If  John  was 
just  rising  to  a  belief  in  Jesus,  the  curt,  enigmatical 
answer  which  Jesus  sends  back  to  him  is  not  easily 
explained,  for  it  seems  calculated  to  check  John's  grow- 
ing faith  rather  than  to  encourage  it.  But  if  the  two 
already  had  talked  the  question  over,  if  perhaps  this 
very  passage  from  Isaiah  they  had  discussed  together, 
Jesus'  answer  would  be  plain  enough  to  John,  and  it 
would  be  all  the  answer  that  Jesus  could  give.  And 
with  all  Jesus'  praise  of  John  we  still  seem  to  detect  in 
his  words  a  slight  censure,  as  if  John,  with  all  his 
greatness,  had  not  been  able  to  rise  to  the  spiritual 
conceptions  of  Jesus,  even  when  the  opportunity  actu- 
ally had  come  to  him. 

How  long  the  ministry  of  John  continued  we  are 
entirely  unable  to  say  ;  and  between  Josephus  and  the 
Gospels,  the  cause  of  his  imprisonment  is  not  quite 
certain.  It  seems  most  likely,  hovv^ever,  that  it  was  not 
until  this  last  event  that  Jesus  entered  upon  the  real 
work  of  his  ministry.  For  this  we  have  the  statement 
of  the  earliest  source  ;  and  if  later  on  the  report  actually 
got  abroad  that  John  had  appeared  again  in  the  person 
of  Jesus,  this  would  point  the  same  way,  for  if  the  two 
had  carried  on  a  public  ministry  together  they  must 
have  been  perfectly  distinct  in  the  popular  mind.  Just 
as  little  do  we  know  the  age  of  Jesus  when  he  began 
his  work,  for  Luke's  statement  that  he  was  thirty  years 
old  has  too  manifest  a  foundation  to  be  trustworthy. 
All  we  can  say  about  it  is  that  he  was  in  the  vigor  of 
his  powers,  and  that  the  conceptions  upon  which  his 
preaching  was  based  had  already  taken  final  and  clearly 
defined  shape.  Before  any  attempt  is  made,  however,  to 


198       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesris. 

formulate  Jesus'  teaching,  a  few  words  will  have  to  be 
said  about  the  principles  which  are  to  be  followed  in 
criticising  the  records  of  Jesus'  sayings  which  are 
present  in  the  Gospels.  The  great  value  of  the  Gos- 
pels lies  in  the  sajdngs  which  they  have  preserved  for 
us,  and  there  cannot  be  the  slightest  doubt  that  a  large 
number  of  these  sayings  are  a  very  exact  report  of 
Jesus'  own  words.  For  the  most  part  they  supply 
their  own  evidence.  The  inexhaustible  charm  which 
the}'  have,  the  combination  of  tenderness  and  vigor, 
the  tireless  play  of  fancy  which  brings  before  us  by  a 
single  stroke  the  deepest  spiritual  truths  in  such  a  way 
that  their  truth  is  made  self-evident,  this  is  all  some- 
thing which  is  quite  inimitable.  But  while  this  is  true 
in  the  main  of  the  Gospel  discourses,  yet  it  would  be 
vain  to  expect  it  to  be  true  everywhere.  In  the  case 
of  books  which  have  arisen  as  our  Gospels  did,  and 
which  contain  so  much  that  is  unreliable  in  their  his- 
torical parts,  it  would  be  almost  a  miracle  if  we  did 
not  find  a  great  deal  attributed  to  Jesus  which  he  never 
uttered,  and  we  ought  constantly  to  be  on  the  lookout 
for  this.  And  as  a  matter  of  fact,  when  one  tries  to 
formulate  Jesus'  teachings  more  exactly,  he  will  come 
across  very  much  indeed  that  will  perplex  him,  and  in 
nearly  every  case,  in  trying  to  determine  what  these 
teachings  were,  we  will  find  evidence  that  is  directly 
contradictory.  And  so  long  as  the  relation  of  the 
three  Gospels  to  one  another  is  left  out  of  the  account, 
it  will  hardly  be  possible  for  him  to  determine  with  any 
certaint)'  what  in  many  cases  Jesus  really  said,  for 
either  he  must  assume  uncritically  that  all  of  the  sa)-- 
ings  which  the  Gospels  record  are  of  equal  genuine- 
ness, or  he  must  attempt  to  distinguish  between  them 
in  a  way  which  at  best  will  have  to  depend  very  much 


The  Preparation.  199 

upon  conjecture.  But  if  once  we  can  determine 
whether  these  sayings  stood  in  the  source  which  our 
Evangelists  used,  or  whether  they  got  them  in  some 
less  reliable  way,  then  at  least  one  great  point  will 
have  been  gained.  Moreover  where,  as  is  the  case 
more  often  than  not,  a  saying  has  got  into  two  or  three 
different  connections,  the  discovery  of  the  original  con- 
nection which  it  had  will  often  throw  a  flood  of  light 
upon  it  ;  and  to  determine  this  with  some  probability 
is  not  in  the  majority  of  cases  a  very  difiicult  thing  to 
do.  For  the  most  part  it  is  Luke  who  has  kept  the 
connection  best,  while  Matthew  more  frequently  than 
I^uke  has  woven  the  sayings  into  long  discourses  ;  but 
of  course  this  cannot  be  given  as  an  unvarying  rule, 
and  it  would  not  be  safe  to  follow  either  blindly.  As 
an  example  of  the  process  which  often  must  be  gone 
through  with,  we  may  take  the  series  of  sayings  which 
is  found  in  the  eleventh  chapter  of  Luke,  where  the 
order  is  as  follows  :  the  dispute  about  casting  out  de- 
mons, the  parable  of  the  unclean  spirit,  the  discourse 
about  a  sign,  the  sayings  about  the  lamp  under  a 
bushel  and  about  the  sound  eye.  Matthew  does  not 
agree  with  this  altogether.  To  begin  with,  he  puts  the 
parable  of  the  unclean  spirit  after  the  demand  for  a 
sign,  not  after  the  dispute  about  casting  out  demons, 
and  in  this  he  seems  to  be  right  ;  for  while  in  Luke 
there  is  a  connection  of  subject,  in  Matthew  there  is 
an  inner  connection  in  meaning  which  is  much 
stronger.  But  what  to  do  about  the  last  two  sayings 
one  does  not  see  so  readily,  for  their  connection  in 
Luke  is  very  forced,  only  an  outer  connection  between 
lamp  and  light,  and  Matthew  gives  them  both  in  sur- 
roundings which  are  wholly  different.  However,  if  the 
first  of  these,  the  saying  about  a  lamp  under  a  bushel, 


200      The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

we  place  as  Matthew  places  it,  at  the  opening  of  the 
Sermon  on  the  Mount,  the  second  one,  the  saying 
about  the  sound  eye,  conies  in  very  naturally  after  the 
parable  of  the  unclean  spirit  and  the  discourse  about  a 
sign.  For  here  it  is  a  rebuke  to  the  people  for  their 
blindness,  while  in  Matthew's  connection  it  only  can 
refer  to  the  aims  on  which  the  heart  is  set,  and  this  has 
no  natural  connection  with  the  sj^mbolism  of  the 
eye. 

In  the  first  place  therefore  we  shall  have  to  deter- 
mine in  what  connection  the  saying  originally  stood. 
No  doubt  the  process  may  often  be  a  tedious  one,  and 
it  would  be  much  easier  if  we  were  able  to  dispense 
with  the  task  altogether  ;  but  to  do  this  would  only 
land  us  in  greater  difiiculties,  and  the  advantage  of  it 
we  think  will  very  quickly  appear.  But  even  if  we 
can  determine  this,  we  still  are  not  sure  that  we  have 
Jesus'  own  words,  for  the  Apostles  may  have  trans- 
mitted them  incorrectly,  or  they  may  have  been  added 
to  at  a  very  early  period,  before  our  three  Gospels 
arose  ;  so  that  the  task  which  it  will  be  necessary  to 
enter  on  is  not  an  easy  one.  And  no  doubt  to  a  very 
great  extent  the  decisions  which  we  come  to  must  be 
subjective — that  is,  the  critic  must  depend  upon  his  own 
sense  of  what  is  likely,  and  in  this  there  is  large  chance 
for  error.  But  still  his  decision  need  not  be  arbitrarj'- ; 
there  are  certain  general  principles  which  in  nearly 
every  case  will  serve  to  guide  him.  He  has,  to  begin 
with,  in  a  very  large  number  of  cases,  two  reports  of  the 
same  saying,  and  a  careful  comparison  of  these  will 
often  prove  exceedingly  suggestive.  As  a  simple  illus- 
tration of  this  we  may  take  the  parable  of  the  lost 
sheep,  as  it  is  found  in  Matthew  and  in  lyuke. 


The  Preparation. 


20I 


In   Matthew. 

How  think  ye?  if  any  man 
have  a  hundred  sheep,  and 
one  of  them  be  gone  astray, 
doth  he  not  leave  the  ninety 
and  nine,  and  go  into  the 
mountains  and  seek  that  which 
goeth  astray  ?  And  if  so  be 
that  he  find  it,  verily  I  say 
unto  you,  he  rejoiceth  over  it 
more  than  over  the  ninety  and 
nine  which  have  not  gone 
astray. 


In  Luke. 

What  man  of  you  having  a 
hundred  sheep,  and  having 
lost  one  of  them,  doth  not  leave 
the  ninety  and  nine  in  the 
wilderness,  and  go  after  that 
which  is  lost,  until  he  find  it  ? 
And  when  he  hath  found  it, 
he  layeth  it  on  his  shoulders 
rejoicing.  And  when  he  cometh 
home,  he  calleth  together  his 
friends  and  his  neighbors,  say- 
ing unto  them.  Rejoice  with 
me,  for  I  have  found  my  sheep 
which  was  lost.  I  say  unto 
you  that  even  so  there  shall 
be  joy  in  heaven  over  one  sin- 
ner that  repenteth,  more  than 
over  ninety  and  nine  righteous 
persons  which  need  no  repen- 
tance. 


Now  we  see  that  this  comparison  of  the  one  with  the 
ninety  and  nine  is  in  both  accounts,  and  therefore  it 
was  in  the  source  from  which  both  drew.  But  while  in 
Luke  this  is  in  the  form  of  an  explanation  which  is  at- 
tached to  the  parable,  and  an  explanation  besides  which 
in  itself  is  somewhat  questionable,  in  Matthew  it  is  an 
integral  part  of  the  parable  itself,  and  comes  in  with 
perfect  naturalness,  so  that  there  can  be  little  doubt  that 
Matthew  is  nearest  the  original.  And  with  this  the 
other  element  in  Luke  will  fall  away  as  an  addition, 
the  calling  together  of  the  neighbors.  And  this  after 
all  only  detracts  from  the  naturalness  of  the  parable, 
for  it  is  not  something  which  would  be  likely  to  happen 
in  everyday  life. 


202       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

Now  there  are  several  principles  which  this  compari- 
son suggests,  and  they  all  of  them  may  be  put  together 
under   one  general  head,   conformity  to  the   style  of 
Jesus.     The  argument  from  style  no  doubt  is  often 
a  dangerous  weapon  to  employ,  but  in  the  case  of  Jesus 
it  is  singularly  effective,  there  scarcely  ever  has  been 
a  style  more  characteristic  and  more  hard  to  imitate. 
It   will  be  worth  while  to  look  at  this  somewhat  closely 
in  special  connection   with  the   parables.      Whatever 
else  may  be  true  of  Jesus'  parables  there  are  two  things 
which  we  always  may  expect  to  find  ;  in  the  first  place 
the  illustration  is  exquisitely  natural,  it  is  taken  from 
the  actual  life  of  the  people  or  from  nature,  and  in  the 
second   place   it   mirrors   forth   a  vSpiritual  truth,  and 
usually  a  single  truth,  by  a  happy  analogy.     But  very 
soon  the  parables  came  to  be  looked  at  as  allegories,  in 
which  each  detail  had  to  have  its  special  exposition. 
There  is  the  parable  of  the  sower,  which  shows  the 
naturalness  of  the  kingdom's  origin  and  its  dependence 
upon  the  laws  of  growth  :  Mark  already  had  found  in 
its  picturesque  touches,  types  of  the  various  classes  of 
Christians,   the  birds   of  the    air   became   Satan,    the 
thorns  tribulations  and  sufferings  ;  and  the  first  Evan- 
gelist follows  him  in  the  baldest  of  allegorical  inter- 
pretations.     Now  it  can  be  said  positively  that  Jesus' 
parables  were  not  allegories.     An  allegory  is  essentially 
artificial,   while  a  parable  is  natural  :  it  is  a  flash  of 
insight  which  discovers   an  analogy  between  spiritual 
and  material  things.     Why  Jesus  chose  to  speak  in 
parables  is  a  question  which  hardly  would  be  raised  if 
it  had  not  been  started  first  by  Mark,  who  cannot  be  said 
however  to  have  thrown  much  light  upon  it.     Naturally 
we  should  suppose  it  was  because  a  parable  is  an  ad- 
mirably vivid  and  efiective  way  of  presenting  truth, 


The  Preparation.  203 

and  because  Jesus'  mind  naturally  turned  to  figure 
rather  than  to  abstract  definition.  But  the  Gospels 
have  another  explanation  for  it.  It  is  not  to  the 
disciples  that  Jesus  speaks  in  parables  but  only  to  the 
people,  "  because,"  says  Matthew,  "  they  are  so  blind 
they  cannot  understand  anything  else,"  "in  order," 
Mark  has  it,  ' '  that  they  may  be  punished  by  having 
the  truth  presented  to  them  in  a  form  they  cannot 
understand."  Now  this  goes  upon  the  assumption, 
which  undoubtedly  the  Evangelists  make,  that  a  parable 
is  an  allegor>%  a  darkening  of  knowledge  and  not  an 
enlightenment.  But  Jesus  certainly  did  not  mean 
that  the  most  important  part  of  his  teaching  should 
hide  the  truth  rather  than  reveal  it,  and  there  is  every 
reason  to  suppose  that  the  parable  was  his  ordinary 
way  of  teaching  in  the  case  of  his  disciples  as  well  as 
of  the  people.  The  whole  passage  to  which  this  inci- 
dent belongs  seems  to  have  been  due  to  Mark.  In  the 
source  there  apparently  was  a  group  of  parables  here, 
and  the  last  one  of  them,  the  parable  of  the  scribe 
instructed  into  the  kingdom,  shows  that  at  least  they 
were  meant  for  the  disciples  as  much  as  for  the  people. 
Mark  has  broken  into  this  series  so  that  he  may  give 
an  allegorical  explanation  of  one  of  them  :  but  that  it 
is  an  interruption  there  are  several  things  which  go  to 
show.  He  has  to  shift  the  scene  in  an  unnatural  way  ; 
he  is  obliged  to  make  up  a  part  of  his  discourse  from 
sayings  which  belong  elsewhere  ;  the  rest  of  it  differs 
decidedly  in  style  from«the  parables  themselves,  and  in 
the  use  of  such  a  phrase  as  the  mystery  oi  the  kingdom, 
and  in  the  absolute  way  in  which  "  the  word"  is  used, 
shows  a  later  theological  stand-point  ;  and  finally  there 
is  the  mistaken  idea  as  to  what  a  parable  is.  In  many 
cases  no  doubt  it  is  not  hard  to  give  the  parable  an 


204      The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

allegorical  turn,  but  this  is  always  arbitrary,  and  it 
alvvaj'S  runs  the  risk  by  its  attention  to  details  of  losing 
the  real  point  of  the  parable  itself.  Even  in  the  par- 
able of  the  sower,  where  it  is  easiest  of  all,  Mark  has 
to  interpret  the  seed,  sometimes  as  the  word  of  preach- 
ing, and  sometimes  as  the  hearer ;  and  when  we  come 
to  apply  it  to  the  parable  of  the  unjust  steward,  or  of 
the  unjust  judge,  or  of  the  discontented  laborers,  the 
difficulties  are  endless.  When  we  find  therefore  that 
we  are  getting  into  allegory,  it  will  make  us  su.spect 
that  we  have  to  do,  not  with  Jesus'  own  words,  but 
with  the  words  of  the  Evangelist  instead.  When  this 
is  something  which  is  added  to  a  parable  of  Jesus'  own 
it  usually  is  not  difficult  to  detect.  There  is  for  ex- 
ample the  allegory  of  the  wedding-garment  which  is 
attached  to  the  parable  of  the  marriage  feast ;  not 
only  does  this  add  an  incongruous  idea  to  a  parable 
which  is  already  complete,  and  which  has  a  perfectly 
plain  and  simple  meaning,  but  Luke  knows  nothing 
about  it.  And  in  the  same  parable  the  "  certain  man  " 
of  Luke  has  been  changed  into  a  king,  who  makes  a 
marriage  feast  for  his  son,  the  Messiah,  whose  servants, 
the  prophets,  are  killed  and  beaten,  and  who  sends  out 
his  armies  to  "  destroy  those  murderers  and  burn  up 
their  city,"  an  obvious  reference  to  the  Jews  and  to 
Jerusalem.  In  the  parable  of  the  talents,  on  the  other 
hand,  Luke  has  been  the  offender,  and  has  brought  in 
a  motiveless  allusion  to  Archelaus.  When  it  is  the 
whole  parable  that  is  at  fault  we  perhaps  cannot  speak 
so  confidently,  and  yet  here  again  we  usually  do  not 
have  to  hesitate  very  long.  The  best  example  of  this 
is  the  parable  of  the  wicked  husbandmen,  which  from 
beginning  to  end  is  nothing  but  an  allegor>\  But  even 
apart  from  the  fact  that  it  is  an  allegory  there  are  many 


The  Pi''eparation.  205 

grounds  for  suspecting  it.  Surelj^  a  parable  which 
assumes  that  Jesus  had  been  slain,  just  as  the  prophets 
had  been  slain,  is  more  natural  in  the  mouth  of  a  dis- 
ciple after  Jesus'  death  than  it  is  in  the  mouth  of  Jesus 
himself,  while  he  was  still  alive.  Jesus  is  spoken  of, 
too,  in  an  unusual  way  as  the  Son  of  God,  and  we  seem 
even  to  get  an  echo  of  the  fact  that  he  was  put  to  death 
without  the  city,  when  it  is  said  that  the  husbandmen 
"  cast  him  out  of  the  vineyard  and  slew  him."  And 
the  parable  violates  another  canon  besides  :  it  is  forced 
and  unnatural,  while  Jesus'  parables  are  always  true  to 
life.  An  allegory  has  indeed  to  be  unnatural,  for  the 
details  do  not  of  their  own  accord  fall  into  place,  and 
it  is  necessary  to  force  them  in  ;  and  so  here  we  find 
the  husbandmen  pursuing  a  design  which  is  quite 
absurd,  and  we  find  the  owner  of  the  vineyard  acting  in 
a  way  in  which  no  one  ever  would  have  acted,  only  that 
the  allegory  may  be  kept  up.  This  is  not  at  all  Jesus' 
method  ;  Jesus  does  not  manufacture  his  parables,  they 
are  revealed  to  him.  And  wherever  we  meet  with  a 
made-up  story,  the  likelihood  is  that  it  must  be  rejected. 
And  before  we  leave  the  matter  of  the  parables,  a 
word  ought  to  be  said  about  the  three  long  parables 
which  are  peculiar  to  Luke,  the  parables  of  the  prodi- 
gal son,  the  good  Samaritan,  and  the  rich  man  and 
Lazarus.  Parables  we  call  them,  but  strictly  they  are 
not  parables  after  all  ;  they  differ  essentially  from  the 
most  of  Jesus'  parables.  Instead  of  expressing  a  spirit- 
ual truth  in  a  natural  analogy,  they  are  simply  illus- 
trations of  a  truth  by  a  fictitious  example.  Cases  of 
something  of  the  same  sort  are  to  be  found  in  the  better 
attested  discourses,  and  the  stor>'  of  the  unforgiving 
debtor,  for  example,  does  not  differ  materially  from  the 
story  of  the  prodigal  son  ;   but  such  instances  are  rare, 


2o6      The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 


and  nothing  indeed  is  quite  parallel  to  the  stories  of  the 
good  Samaritan  and  of  L,azarus.  Moreover,  all  the 
three  narratives  have  certain  peculiarities  about  them, 
in  the  manner  of  narration,  which  serve  to  set  them  oflf 
by  themselves  apart  from  the  other  discourses  of  Jesus. 
A  suspicion  about  them,  therefore,  inevitably  arises, 
not  simply  because  they  stand  in  a  measure  by  them- 
selves, but  because  this  difference  from  Jesus'  ordinary 
manner  only  appears  in  the  late  and  untrustworthy  tra- 
dition which  is  represented  by  lyuke.  And  against 
each  of  these  three  stories  there  are  special  grounds 
of  objection.  The  introduction  to  the  story  of  the 
Samaritan  is  constructed  out  of  an  incident  which  in 
its  original  form  had  an  entirely  different  turn  ;'  the 
story  of  the  prodigal  son  appears  to  be  based  upon  a 
much  simpler  parable  in  Matthew,  the  parable  of  the 
two  sons  ;  and  the  story  of  lyazarus,  besides  being  in- 
troduced by  sayings  which  did  not  at  first  belong  to  it, 
is  very  obscure,  and  just  what  it  teaches  is  a  puzzle. 
From  the  final  sentence  we  should  think  that  it  was 
meant  to  show  the  validity  of  the  I^aw  of  Moses  ;  and 
yet  this  sentence  only  is  tacked  on  to  the  end  of  the 
story,  without  receiving  any  proof  or  illustration  from 
it,  and  might  quite  as  well  have  stood  alone.  The  whole 
thing  cannot  readily  be  made  to  teach  anything  except 
the  virtue  of  poverty  and  the  damnableness  of  wealth. 
The  beauty  of  the  first  two  stories  is  undeniable,  but 
their  beauty  is  not  lessened  if  they  come  from  some 
one  else  than  Jesus  ;  and  of  course  it  would  be  very 
easy  for  anything  of  the  kind  to  get  attributed  to  Jesus 
when  its  real  origin  was  forgotten. 

If  we  turn  back  now  to  the  point  from  which  we 
started,  the  parable  of  the  lost  sheep,  the  comparison 

'  See  Matt.  22  :  y^ff. 


The  Preparation.  207 

will  suggest  another  caution,  that  the  applications  of 
the  parables  are  much  more  likely  to  be  the  work  of 
the  Evangelists  than  of  Jesus,  and  that  the  Evangelists 
are  by  no  means  certain  to  be  right.  When  the  first 
Evangelist  converts  the  sign  of  Jonah  into  a  prediction 
of  the  resurrection,  we  have  a  striking  example  of  this 
in  a  little  different  field,  but  less  apparent  examples  are 
scattered  through  the  Gospels.  "Or  else,"  says  Jesus 
in  the  parable  of  the  warring  kings,  ' '  while  the  other 
is  yet  a  great  way  off,  he  sendeth  an  ambassage  and 
asketh  conditions  of  peace  ' '  ;  and  the  Evangelist  adds, 
"  So,  therefore,  whosoever  he  be  of  you  that  renounc- 
eth  not  all  that  he  hath,  he  cannot  be  my  disciple," — 
here  the  application  seems  to  be  connected  with  the 
Evangelist's  peculiar  views  about  poverty.  In  general 
it  seems  plain  that  Jesus  left  his  hearers  to  make  their 
application  for  themselves,  and  when  we  find  the  moral 
given  too  expressly  we  must  be  suspicious  of  it.  And 
somewhat  in  line  with  this  there  are  likely  to  be  a  num- 
ber of  cases  where,  without  any  external  mark  of  it, 
the  Evangelist  has  modified  what  he  has  before  him  in 
a  greater  or  less  degree.  Such  cases  cannot  be  classi- 
fied, and  no  absolute  demonstration  can  be  given  for 
them  ;  much  will  have  to  be  left  to  the  feeling  of  the 
reader.  There  is  the  quotation  in  the  Sermon  on  the 
Mount  which  Jesus  makes  from  the  Old  Testament, 
"Thou  shalt  love  thy  neighbor,  and" — so  Matthew 
adds — "hate  thine  enemy."  But  this  of  course  we 
shall  not  find  in  the  Old  Testament,  and,  moreover,  the 
contrast  in  Jesus'  thought  is  not  between  hating  our 
enemies  and  loving  them,  but  between  loving  our 
friends  and  loving  our  enemies  as  well,  between  partial 
and  universal  love  :  may  we  not  venture  therefore  to 
throw  the  last  clause  out  of  Jesus'  words  ?    Sometimes 


2o8       The  Life  a7id  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

the  insertion  has  been  a  more  important  one  than  this. 
In  the  discourse  about  John,  for  instance,  there  is  a 
sentence  in  which  Jesus  speaks  of  John  as  fulfilling  a 
prophecy  in  Isaiah,  But  if  we  drop  this  out  and  notice 
how  closely  the  parts  on  either  side  of  it  fit  together — 
"yea,  I  say  unto  you,  and  more  than  a  prophet. 
Among  those  born  of  women  there  hath  not  arisen  a 
greater," — it  will  seem  most  likely  that  some  Evangelist 
on  his  own  notion  has  thrust  in  this  prophecy  which 
the  Church  had  found  for  John.  For  it  is  to  take  all 
the  meaning  out  of  Jesus'  words  to  make  him  put 
John's  greatness  simply  in  the  fact  that  he  had  an- 
nounced the  immediate  coming  of  the  Messiah.  And 
still  another  instance  is  that  most  violent  of  all  the 
words  attributed  to  Jesus,  "ye  serpents,  ye  offspring 
of  vipers,  how  can  ye  escape  the  damnation  of  Ge- 
henna !  "  which  in  this  case  betraj^s  itself  by  its  de- 
pendence on  the  words  of  the  Baptist. 

It  is  evident  therefore  that  to  determine  just  what 
Jesus  said  is  not  a  work  which  can  be  done  off-hand  ; 
it  requires  a  continual  weighing  and  sifting.  And  there 
is  a  special  danger  from  the  fact  that  Jesus  is  so  far 
above  his  hearers,  that  just  so  soon  as  they  leave  the 
task  simply  of  reporting  word  for  word  what  Jesus 
said,  they  are  pretty  certain  to  bring  their  own  mis- 
conceptions in.  We  constantly  shall  find  upon  the 
same  subject  views  attributed  to  Jesus  which  are  mutu- 
ally inconsistent,  a  spiritual  view,  and  a  materialistic, 
Jewish  view,  and  we  shall  have  to  choose  between 
them.  And  this  furnishes  one  other  rule  of  interpre- 
tation :  whenever  we  find  that  this  is  the  case,  the 
probabilities  in  so  far  lie  with  the  more  spiritual  view. 
Jesus  we  know  in  many  things  did  rise  far  above  his 
contemporaries  ;    it  is  more  likely  therefore  that  his 


The  Prcpa7^atio7i.  209 

reporters  have  brought  him  down  to  their  own  level 
than  that  they  have  been  able  to  rise  above  him.  It  is 
true  that  we  cannot  assume  this  without  question  in 
every  case  ;  only  the  evidence  for  a  belief  which  puts 
Jesus  below  his  own  general  level  must  needs  be 
stronger  than  that  which  would  satisfy  us  in  the  case 
of  a  belief  which  harmonizes  with  Jesus'  other  teach- 
ings. And  upon  this  principle  of  course  we  must  al- 
ways go,  that  what  is  uncertain  must  be  judged  by 
what  is  sure.  There  are  some  things  in  Jesus'  teaching 
which  we  can  establish  beyond  a  doubt,  and  other 
things  must  be  at  least  in  a  measure  consistent  with 
these.  To  establish  anything  upon  a  single  saying,  or 
even  to  establish  it  upon  two  or  three  sayings,  will  be 
hazardous,  unless  the  genuineness  of  these  sayings  is 
pretty  certain.  With  these  things  in  mind  therefore 
we  shall  try  to  bring  into  order  the  somewhat  chaotic 
condition  of  the  Gospels,  and  to  determine  in  their 
main  outlines  what  the  essential  points  in  Jesus'  doc- 
trine were. 
14 


CHAPTER  II. 


THE   KINGDOM  OF   HEAVEN. 


WHAT  then  was  the  sum  of  Jesus'  teaching  ? 
What  lay  at  the  centre  of  the  announcement 
which  he  had  to  make  to  his  nation  ?  Mark, 
as  it  seems,  was  the  first  to  give  a  literary  form  to 
this  :  Jesus,  he  says,  came  into  Galilee  preaching  the 
Gospel  of  God  and  saying.  The  time  is  fulfilled,  and 
the  kingdom  of  God  is  at  hand  ;  repent  ye,  and  be- 
lieve in  the  Gospel.  Now  certainly  Jesus  did  not  use 
these  very  words,  and  the  passage  only  pretends  to  be  a 
summary  of  his  message ;  but  to  this  extent  undoubtedly 
Mark  is  right,  that  it  is  the  kingdom  of  heaven 
which  Jesus  came  to  proclaim.  But  Mark  also  gives 
us  the  impression  which,  knowing  nothing  to  the 
contrary,  would  be  the  natural  view  to  hold,  that  Jesus' 
attitude  towards  the  kingdom  was  essentially  the 
attitude  of  his  nation,  an  attitude  to  which  the  national, 
the  political  features  were  by  no  means  unimportant, 
even  if  they  did  not  occupy  the  foremost  place.  Cer- 
tainly if  Jesus  had  made  his  announcement  in  this  bald 
way  the  people  could  have  got  no  other  notion  from  it, 
and  if  he  had  announced  it  as  something  which  was 
at  hand,  as  something  coming  in  the  future,  the 
inference  would  be  the  same.     But  Mark's  statement  in 


The  Kingdom  of  Heaven.  2 1 1 


itself  has  no  value,  for  it  is  dependent  on  the  words  of 
John  the  Baptist ;  and  if  we  look  at  the  actual  say- 
ings of  Jesus  we  shall  see  at  once  that,  whatever  his 
idea  of  the  kingdom  may  have  been,  it  differed  greatly 
from  the  idea  which  his  countrymen  had  of  it. 

By  far  the  most  complete  statement  which  Jesus 
makes  of  his  position  is  to  be  found  in  the  Sermon  on 
the  Mount,  and  indeed  it  would  seem  that  Jesus  here 
intended  to  give  in  a  brief  form  the  substance  of  his 
teaching  about  the  kingdom.  The  discourse  was 
spoken  to  the  disciples,  as  all  the  internal  evidence  goes 
to  show,  and  it  probably  belongs  to  the  latter  part  of 
Jesus'  ministry  ;  for  so  long  a  sermon  could  not  easily 
have  been  remembered  when  the  disciples  were 
new  to  Jesus'  teaching.  Unfortunately,  we  do  not 
now  have  this  discourse  in  its  original  form,  as  a  com* 
parison  of  Matthew  and  of  lyuke  will  soon  convince 
one.  Luke  has  abbreviated  constantly  by  leaving  out 
those  sayings  which  have  reference  to  Jewish  customs 
and  beliefs,  and  what  he  has  retained  he  often  has 
paraphrased  very  freely  ;  while  Matthew  in  his  usual 
fashion  has  interwoven  with  it  sayings  which  at  first 
were  quite  distinct.  But  many  of  these  sayings  are 
still  to  be  found  in  Luke  in  a  far  better  connection, 
and  by  a  careful  comparison  it  is  possible  to  restore 
within  reasonable  limits  the  discourse  as  it  stood  origi- 
nally. It  appears  to  start  with  that  Luke,  apart  from 
the  Woes,  which  he  certainly  adds  on  his  own  account, 
has  the  Beatitudes  in  a  more  original  form.  Luke's 
version  of  them  is  so  consistent  that  it  is  hard  to  think 
he  got  it  by  mutilating  the  longer  form  in  Matthew, 
while  Matthew  on  the  other  hand  is  not  quite  con- 
gruous throughout,  he  borrows  liberally  from  the  Old 
Testament,  and  his  changes  are  easily  to  be  explained 


212       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

on  the  basis  of  a  simpler  account.  The  first  Beatitude  in 
particular,  despite  the  efforts  to  find  a  profound  mean- 
ing in  it,  is  not  a  natural  expression,  as  the  very  neces- 
sity for  these  efforts  shows,  and  it  is  easily  accounted 
for  as  a  somewhat  mechanical  addition  to  the  ' '  poor  ' ' 
of  Luke.  Then,  too,  the  second  Beatitude  Matthew 
has  been  forced  to  leave  without  spiritualizing  it. 
Besides,  the  direct  address,  "  Blessed  are  ye,"  is  proven 
at  any  rate  for  the  last  Beatitude,  so  that  the  tenth 
verse  in  Matthew  is  a  repetition  which  is  due  to  him  ; 
and  the  way  in  which  the  Sermon  goes  on  in  Matthew 
shows  that  Jesus  is  speaking  to  his  disciples  directly. 
From  this  point,  however,  there  is  little  to  do  except  to 
throw  out  those  sayings  which  have  a  better  connec- 
tion in  lyuke.  These  are  the  sayings  about  salt,  where 
the  warning  is  not  called  for  by  the  context,  about  the 
adversary  and  about  divorce,  the  Lord's  prayer,  the 
discourse  about  laying  up  treasure,  and  all  that  follows 
it  through  the  warnings  against  anxiety.  Then  the 
saying  about  pearls  before  swine,  while  it  is  not  found 
in  Luke,  hardly  belongs  here,  for  it  breaks  into  the 
connection ;  and  the  two  discourses  about  seeking 
and  finding,  and  about  the  narrow  way,  also  find  their 
place  in  Luke.  Again  in  Luke  the  last  part  of  the 
Sermon — Luke  6  :  43-45 — seems  to  follow  the  original 
more  closely  than  Matthew  does,  for  Matthew  makes 
these  words  refer  to  false  prophets,  which  is  contrary 
to  the  whole  meaning  of  the  discourse.  Jesus  has 
been  referring  throughout  to  personal  conduct,  he  ends 
with  a  reference  to  personal  conduct,  and  it  must  be  of 
the  same  thing  that  he  is  speaking  here.  And  this  is 
shown  also  by  the  literary  structure  of  Matthew. 
Luke  reads  :  "  A  good  tree  bringeth  not  forth  corrupt 
fruit,  neither  doth  a  corrupt  tree  bring  forth  good  fruit. 


The  Kingdom  of  Heaven.  2 1 3 

For  every  tree  is  known  by  its  own  fruit.  For  of 
thorns  men  do  not  gather  figs,  nor  of  a  bramble 
bush  gather  they  grapes."  Matthew,  on  account  of  his 
reference  to  false  prophets,  starts  with  ' '  Ye  shall  know 
them  by  their  fruits."  Then  he  goes  back  to  the  verse 
he  has  omitted,  but  after  it  he  again  repeats,  ' '  By  their 
fruits  ye  shall  know  them, ' '  just  as  it  is  found  in  lyuke  ; 
so  that  this  seems  to  be  the  right  place  for  the  saying. 
Now  if  we  examine  carefully  the  discourse  which 
we  have  left  after  this  critical  process,  it  will  be  found 
that  there  is  one  very  definite  conception  which  domi- 
nates the  whole  of  it,  which  Jesus  insists  upon,  and 
which  he  says  expressly  is  the  crucial  point  in  the  rela- 
tion of  the  citizen  to  the  new  kingdom.  The  kingdom 
implies  of  course  the  rule  of  God,  but  it  is  a  govern- 
ment which  has  absolutely  nothing  external  about  it, 
which  is  directed  towards  the  heart  and  conscience  of 
the  individual  citizen,  which  aims,  not  to  bring  about 
outward  conformity  simply,  but  comformity  which  is 
due  to  character,  and  which  in  every  detail  rests 
squarely  upon  the  great,  and  to  Jesus  the  self-evident 
principles  of  righteousness.  Do  not  be  angry,  be  for- 
giving, avoid  lustful  thoughts,  be  scrupulously  truth- 
ful, return  good  for  evil,  love  your  enemies,  avoid  pride 
and  ostentation,  be  merciful  and  charitable  in  judg- 
ment ;  it  is  by  your  fruits  that  you  will  be  j  udged,  he 
who  follows  these  commandments  of  mine  is  the  wise 
man,  he  who  neglects  them  the  fool, — from  beginning 
to  end  a  single  note  runs  through  the  whole,  it  is  in 
this  the  kingdom  consists,  and  there  is  no  hint  that  it 
consists  in  anything  else.  If  one  were  to  put  it  in  a 
single  sentence  it  would  be  something  like  this — the 
kingdom  of  heaven  is  the  rule  of  righteousness  in 
human  life,  when   righteousness  is  not  looked  at  as 


2 1 4      The  Life  a7id  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

something  external,  but  as  the  natural  fruits  of  a 
heart  that  is  governed  by  love  to  God  and  love  to  men. 
If  this  really  is  the  heart  of  Jesus'  idea  of  the  king- 
dom, when  we  take  into  account  all  that  it  implies  it  is 
far  and  away  the  greatest  achievement  in  religious 
thought  which  the  world  has  witnessed.  That  Jesus 
should  have  held  so  tenaciousl}^  to  the  elements  of  real 
and  permanent  religious  value  for  which  the  human 
heart  can  never  cease  to  crave,  and  that  he  yet  should 
have  been  able  to  free  these  so  effectually  from  the 
extra-beliefs,  the  transient  forms  by  which  men's  fan- 
cies have  tried  to  picture  to  themselves  the  eternal  veri- 
ties of  which  dimly  and  partially  they  had  caught  a 
glimpse,  and  should  have  brought  out  into  a  clear  light 
their  intimate  and  absolutely  essential  relationship  to 
conduct,  would  be  a  marvel  in  any  case,  and  it  is  the 
more  marvellous  when  we  consider  how  absolutely  for- 
eign it  all  was  to  the  Judaism  of  the  times.  Indeed, 
even  to  the  present  day  the  Church  has  not  been  able 
to  convince  itself  that  religion,  if  it  is  to  be  secure, 
does  not  need  the  extra  support  of  all  these  appeals  to 
the  imagination  and  the  material  sense.  Most  of  all, 
men  constantly  are  clamoring  for  something  in  religion 
which  shall  serve  to  guarantee  for  them  their  own  hap- 
piness and  safety,  and  the  closer  they  can  cling  to  the 
solid  foundation  of  a  sensible  earth,  the  better  they  are 
pleased.  Accordingly,  in  Jesus'  day,  the  great  mass 
of  the  people  were  for  having  an  earthly  kingdom, 
with  plenty  to  eat  and  drink,  a  king  with  supernatural 
powers  enough  to  insure  their  getting  the  better  of 
their  enemies,  and  a  certain  amount  of  worship  and 
morality,  no  doubt,  somewhere  in  the  background. 
From  this  it  is  a  long  ways,  certainly,  to  the  ordinary 
conception  of  Christianity,  and  yet  something  of  the 


The  Kingdom  of  Heaven.  2 1 5 

same  mistake  there  is  in  both  :  both,  that  is,  put  reli- 
gion too  much  in  the  idea  of  the  reward  attached  to  it 
from  the  outside.  In  Christianity  this  appears  in  the 
altogether  disproportionate  place  which  is  given  to  the 
doctrine  of  heaven.  This  is  what  the  kingdom  of 
heaven  earl}^  came  to  stand  for  :  it  was  taken  to  mean 
a  future  kingdom  into  which  death  alone  can  bring  us, 
heaven,  shut  off  by  the  sharpest  boundaries  from  the 
things  of  earth.  Now,  without  doubt,  there  is  much 
in  this  conception  which  answers  to  a  real  religious 
need,  and  which  we  could  ill  afford  to  do  without.  We 
need  the  comfort  of  looking  to  the  future,  when  the 
conditions  which  hem  us  in  and  thwart  us,  and  so  often 
render  wickedness  triumphant  and  goodness  impotent, 
shall  be  done  away,  when  joy  shall  take  the  place  of 
sadness,  and  that  harmony  which  we  crave  in  vain  in 
our  present  life  shall  be  a  thing  accomplished.  But 
then,  this  is  not  the  whole  of  religion,  and  it  is  not  the 
core  of  it,  and  by  putting  the  first  emphasis  upon  it,  it 
may  lead  to  a  religion  which  is  very  faulty  and  per- 
verted. And  this  alwa3^s  has  been  the  tendency  in 
human  thought.  Religion  has  been  made  to  gather 
about  the  soul's  salvation,  salvation,  that  is,  in  this 
narrow  sense,  of  escape  from  punishment  and  the  get- 
ting of  a  heavenly  reward.  Duty,  conduct,  character, 
have  been  hardly  more  than  a  road  to  heaven  and 
eternal  happiness.  But  it  is  clear  that  this  hope,  just 
of  getting  into  heaven,  unless  it  is  bound  up  very 
closely  indeed  with  the  thought  of  the  sort  of  character 
which  heaven  implies,  is  only  a  selfish  hope,  none  the 
less  selfish,  only  a  bit  more  etherialized,  because  the 
objects  of  its  desire  are  after  death  rather  than  before 
it.  And  selfishness  is  not  religion.  God  is  not  God, 
truth  is  not  truth,  goodness  is  not  goodness,  simply 


2i6      The  Life  and  Teachings  of  fesus. 

that  you  and  I  may  be  forever  happy.  It  may  be  that 
God  would  not  be  God  if  there  were  not  true  and  last- 
ing joy  within  the  reach  of  men,  but  at  least  the  em- 
phasis must  not  be  put  upon  the  wrong  side.  Now, 
this  is  what,  in  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  Jesus 
appears  to  recognize  and  teach  :  God,  righteousness, — 
these  are  first  and  foremost.  Blessedness  they  do  in- 
deed bring  with  them,  but  it  is  not  the  blessedness 
which  gives  to  them  their  worth,  and  it  is  only  by 
striving  after  them  for  their  own  sakes  that  the  blessed- 
ness will  come.  Jesus'  kingdom  is  a  kingdom  which 
rests  upon  character.  It  is  the  bringing  into  the  indi- 
vidual and  into  the  universal  life  the  eternal  principles 
of  righteousness.  It  is  the  joyful  recognition  of  these, 
not  simply  as  leading  to  my  happiness,  but  as  in  them- 
selves eternally  worthy  and  binding.  It  is  the  swallow- 
ing up  of  the  selfish  will  in  the  will  of  God,  and  the 
recognition  that  God's  will  is  not  something  vague  and 
belonging  to  another  world  than  this,  but  that  it  un- 
folds itself  in  the  ordinary  human  relations  and  duties. 
It  is  human  society  become  divine  by  having  all  the 
selfishness  in  it  rooted  out,  and  God's  will  recognized 
freely  by  each  individual. 

But  it  may  be  said  that  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount 
does  not  necessarily  imply  all  this,  or  at  least  that  it 
does  not  imply  this  conception  so  exclusively.  For  one 
may  still  insist  with  all  strenuousness  upon  the  need 
of  character,  and  yet  make  the  kingdom  itself  to  con- 
sist in  some  more  outward  and  sensible  relationship 
between  God  and  men.  This  was  true  of  John,  for 
example.  No  man  yielded  to  John  in  the  assertion  of 
the  supremacy  of  righteousness,  and  yet  to  him  the 
kingdom  was  not  come  till  the  sinners  were  weeded 
out  of  the  nation  and  the  Messiah  had  appeared,  a 


The  Kijigdoiu  of  Heaven.  2  i  7 

visible  representative  of  God's  sway.  So  in  Jesus' 
case  it  may  have  been  that,  while  he  set  up  conduct  as 
an  absolute  necessity  for  the  citizen,  he  nevertheless 
b}^  the  kingdom  itself  meant  not  this  only,  but  a  special 
and  supernatural  relationship  into  which  God  was  to 
enter  with  men,  either  a  supra-mundane,  heavenly  con- 
summation, when  the  principles  which  he  had  laid 
down  were  to  be  completely  victorious,  or  it  may  be 
even  an  earthly  realization  of  a  completely  righteous 
nation,  perhaps  established  by  a  special  display  of 
God's  power.  Both  of  these  suppositions,  in  so  far  as 
they  involve  a  supernatural  intervention,  we  shall  have 
to  consider  more  at  length  in  another  chapter,  when  we 
come  to  ask  what  Jesus  expected  of  the  future  of  his 
kingdom.  For  the  present,  just  a  word  may  be  suffi- 
cient. It  is  often  said  that  the  two  conceptions,  the 
thought  of  the  kingdom  as  the  natural  growth  of  men 
in  their  individual  lives  and  their  social  relations  into 
the  divine  character,  and  as  the  consummation  of  all 
things  in  a  society  under  supernatural  conditions,  are 
not  mutually  inconsistent,  but  are  only  the  two  parts 
of  one  conception.  This  claim,  however,  is  only 
partially  true.  No  doubt  it  is  a  fact  that  Jesus  be- 
lieved in  what  we  may  call  by  the  name  of  Heaven. 
Nevertheless,  heaven  stands  first  of  all  for  the  idea  of 
happiness,  of  rest  and  peace  after  the  conflict  of  life, 
of  the  satisfaction  of  human  cravings,  and  as  such  it 
is  entirely  distinct  from  the  idea  of  righteousness  and 
its  authoritative  claims,  which,  from  the  nature  of  the 
case,  we  can  represent  only  under  the  form  of  the  hu- 
man relationships  and  duties  which  we  are  familiar 
with.  Accordingly,  while  one  may  hold  the  two  ideas 
together  and  find  in  one  the  supplement  of  the  other, 
yet  they  are  two  ideas  after  all,  and  it  is  not  easy  to 


2i8       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

combine  them  into  one  definite  conception  without 
shghting  the  one  or  the  other.  And  it  makes  all  the 
difference  in  the  world  whether  religion  is  made  to 
centre  first  of  all  about  the  future,  or  about  the  every- 
day duties  of  the  present.  And  all  that  we  are  trying 
to  maintain  is  that,  while  Jesus  recognized  hope  for  the 
future  as  a  legitimate  incentive  and  consolation,  he  did 
not  lay  the  stress  of  his  teaching  upon  this,  but  made 
it  to  centre  about  conduct  and  character  for  this  present 
world  ;  and  this  is  what  we  think  the  Sermon  on  the 
Mount  tends  to  show.  This,  however,  we  shall  return 
to  later.  But  apart  from  all  question  of  the  super- 
natural, it  will  be  necessary  to  take  a  somewhat  more 
extended  survey  of  Jesus'  teaching  about  the  kingdom 
with  reference  to  the  charge  which  often  has  been 
brought  against  him,  and  which  has,  perhaps,  not  been 
sufficiently  replied  to  as  yet,  that,  after  all,  though  doubt- 
less with  the  best  and  most  patriotic  of  intentions,  politi- 
cal motives  did  have  some  weight  with  him,  and  that 
his  hope  for  a  righteous  nation  was  somehow  or  other 
connected  with  the  deliverance  of  Israel  from  the  adverse 
external  conditions  with  which  it  was  struggling. 

As  against  any  such  political  aim  on  Jesus'  part,  the 
very  name  which  he  chooses  is  significant.  According 
to  Mark  and  Luke  it  is  the  kingdom  of  God,  but  Mat- 
thew has  it,  the  kingdom  of  heaven.  It  is  not  probable 
that  both  names  were  used  as  the  ordinary  designation, 
and  from  critical  reasons,  as  well  as  from  historical, 
Matthew  is  probably  to  be  preferred.  In  one  verse  at 
least — Matt.  7  :  21 — "  heaven  "  seems  to  be  required  by 
the  parallelism  of  the  sentence  ;  and  in  another  case — 
21  :  43 — Matthew  himself  has  "  kingdom  of  God,"  and 
he  has  it  in  a  verse  which  seems  to  be  due  to  himself. 
So  that  it  is  not  probable  that  he  would  have  changed 


The  Kingdom  of  Heaven.  2 1 9 

"God"  to  "heaven"  wherever  he  found  it  in  his 
source,  and  then  have  used  ' '  God  ' '  himself  where  no 
change  would  have  been  necessary.  But  "  the  king- 
dom of  heaven  "  is  just  such  a  title  as  we  might  have 
expected  one  to  use  who  wished  to  dissociate  his  king- 
dom as  much  as  possible  from  all  earthly  empire,  and 
point  to  it  simply  as  a  divine  ideal  to  be  realized  among 
men.  And  then  the  kingdom — so  Jesus  implies  at  the 
beginning  of  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount — was  something 
which  was  intended  to  bring  joy,  blessedness,  and  to 
bring  it  into  the  lives  of  those  who  stood  most  in  need 
of  it,  of  the  poor,  the  wretched,  whom  religion,  as  well 
as  philosophy  and  culture,  had  hitherto  been  very  apt 
to  neglect.  One  who  had  come  to  announce  the  restora- 
tion of  the  national  greatness,  the  approach  of  a  time 
when  the  religion  of  their  ancestors  might  be  enjoyed 
free  of  disturbance,  never  would  have  spoken  first  of 
all  in  this  way.  This  tenderness  towards  the  weak 
ones  of  mankind,  and  the  confidence  that  he  has  that 
which  will  fill  the  void  in  their  lives,  is  one  of  the 
striking  things  in  Jesus'  teaching  :  but  he  always  rep- 
resents this  ministry  as  a  moral  one  ;  he  has  come  to 
heal  the  sick  who  need  a  physician  ;  and  he  never  re- 
gards this  as  a  means,  as  a  reform  of  the  nation  which 
will  allow  the  political  ideal  to  be  realized,  but  as  the 
end  in  itself.  He  that  is  but  little  in  the  kingdom  of 
heaven,  he  says,  is  greater  than  John,  and  this  has  no 
meaning  unless  the  greatness  of  the  kingdom  is  solely 
a  spiritual  greatness,  an  eminence  in  spiritual  knowl- 
edge and  achievement.  And  indeed  in  so  many  words 
Jesus  puts  the  kingdom  and  righteousness  together, 
as  if  they  were  one  and  the  same  thing,  and  sharply 
distinguishes  them  from  other,  from  material  things.' 

'  Matt.  6  :  33. 


2  20      The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 


And  once  again,  in  the  prayer  which  he  makes,  the 
kingdom  is  to  come  when  God's  will  is  done  on  earth. 
It  is  the  innocence  and  the  humilit}'  of  the  child  which 
is  the  necessary  condition  of  entrance.  The  harvest  is 
to  be  reaped,  not  by  the  expulsion  of  the  Romans  and 
the  setting  up  of  a  kingdom  of  the  saints,  but  by  the 
work  of  the  laborers  who  are  to  be  sent  forth  into  the 
harvest,  among  the  people.  The  Pharisees,  Jesus  com- 
plains, have  shut  up  the  kingdom  of  heaven  against 
men,  and  not  content  with  refusing  to  enter  in  them- 
selves, they  have  kept  out  those  who  were  on  the  point 
of  entering.  If  alreadj^  they  have  done  this,  the  king- 
dom already  is  established,  and  their  fault  is  that  they 
have  refused  to  see  it  in  the  righteousness  which  Jesus 
preached.  And  indeed  Jesus  tells  them  on  another 
occasion  that  while  thej^  are  looking  for  some  outward 
demonstration  to  which  they  can  point  and  saj',  L,o 
here,  or  I^o  there,  the  kingdom  already  has  sprung  up 
silently  in  their  midst. 

An  ideal  such  as  this  certainly  has  very  little  in  com- 
mon with  political  aims  of  au)^  sort,  indeed  it  seems 
entirely  to  exclude  them  ;  and  there  are  other  sayings 
of  Jesus  which  establish  this  still  more  securely.  The 
recognition  of  the  kingdom  and  its  Messiah,  so  Jesus 
tells  Peter,  does  not  belong  to  flesh  and  blood,  and, 
therefore,  it  must  be  something  which  is  purely  spirit- 
ual, and  has  nothing  to  do  with  earthly  things.  If 
Ivuke  is  to  be  trusted,  we  find  Jesus  expressly  re- 
jecting the  function  which  would  have  been  proper  to 
him  as  the  Messiah  of  the  popular  kingdom,  the  func- 
tion of  judge  and  divider,  and  he  certainly  declines  to 
have  anything  to  do  with  the  question  which,  if  in  any 
sense  his  aim  had  been  political,  he  must  have  attached 
some  importance  to,  the  relation  in  which  the  country 


The  Kingdom  of  Heaven.  221 

stood  to  Caesar  and  the  Roman  government.  Still,  one 
has  to  recognize  two  or  three  elements  in  the  Gospels 
which  seem  to  go  against  this  view,  and  to  show  that 
Jesus  after  all  was  not  wholly  untouched  by  the  popular 
ideals.  One  thing  indeed  which  might  be  used  to  show 
this,  does  really,  we  think,  point  the  other  way,  the 
promise  which  Jesus  makes  to  his  disciples,  seemingly 
a  political  promise,  that  they  shall  sit  on  twelve  thrones 
judging  the  twelve  tribes  of  Israel.  If  this  really  was 
spoken  by  Jesus,  and  was  meant  to  be  understood  liter- 
ally, then  Jesus  must  have  thought  of  a  political  eman- 
cipation, however  this  emancipation  was  to  be  brought 
about.  But  if  this  imagery  is  to  be  taken  literally,  it 
stands  very  nearly  alone  among  Jesus'  sayings,  and 
that  fact  by  itself  would  almost  be  enough  to  show  the 
saying  was  not  genuine ;  and  so  soon  as  we  get  it  in 
its  right  connection  we  shall  see  that  there  is  no  need 
of  its  being  taken  literally  at  all.  The  connection 
which  Matthew  gives  to  it  is  hardly  possible,  for  it 
seems  clearly  to  be  thrust  in  between  Peter's  question 
and  the  real  answer  which  was  given  to  that  question.^ 
But  lyuke  places  it  at  the  end  of  a  discourse,  the  dis- 
course on  ambition,  which,  as  the  other  Kvatigelists 
show,  was  called  forth  by  a  request  which  James  and 
John  had  made  ;  and  here  it  fits  in  admirably.  James 
and  John  had  come  to  Jesus  asking  for  the  chief  places 
in  the  kingdom  of  heaven,  a  kingdom  which  they  still 
looked  upon  as  something  material  ;  and  Jesus'  words 
on  the  occasion  are  significant.  He  does  not  say  that 
hereafter  the  chief  place  shall  be  given  to  him  who 
deserves  it  best  by  his  service,  that  humility  and  self- 
sacrifice  now  shall  be  exchanged  for  honor  and  posi- 
tion when  the  kingdom  is  established :  he  says  that 
'  Matt.  19  :  28. 


222        The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 


humility  is  greatness,  that  the  chief  place  consists  in 
being  the  servant  of  all.  And  then,  when  iimnedi- 
ately  he  promises  to  the  Twelve  the  greatness  which 
James  and  John  had  just  been  seeking,  we  only  can 
interpret  this  by  what  Jesus  himself  has  said.  The  great- 
ness which  he  promises  to  them  is  the  greatness  of  ser- 
vice ;  it  is  the  superiority  which  comes  from  doing  and 
from  suffering  the  most,  the  superiority  which  Jesus 
himself  had  won  ;  and  the  form  in  which  he  puts  this 
probably  was  suggested  by  the  brothers'  question. 
This,  we  think  therefore,  shows  what  we  have  found 
was  shown  by  other  things,  that  Jesus'  conception  of 
the  kingdom  was  wholly  spiritual  ;  there  are  two 
things,  however,  which  cannot  easily  be  explained  in 
this  way  and  which  apparently  show  a  very  different 
point  of  view,  and  these  are  the  mission  of  the  twelve 
Apostles,  and  the  entry  into  Jerusalem. 

With  regard  to  the  mission  of  the  disciples  it  is  hard 
to  see  how,  under  the  circumstances,  it  could  have 
failed  to  have  a  very  conspicuous  political  significance. 
In  the  first  place  the  disciples  themselves  thought  of 
the  kingdom  much  as  the  people  thought  of  it,  and  as 
yet  were  far  from  comprehending  the  real  bearing  of 
Jesus'  conception.  And  even  if  they  partly  had  under- 
stood him,  the  people  could  not  have  done  so  ;  to  them 
the  disciples'  words  only  could  have  had  one  meaning. 
And  then  when  we  ask  in  what  the  disciples'  message 
consisted  we  meet  with  difficult}-.  If  apart  from  Jesus' 
teachings  about  the  kingdom  they  pointed  to  Jesus  as 
the  Messiah,  they  simply  were  sowing  the  seeds  of 
revolution  ;  and  even  if  they  did  not  do  this  expressly, 
if,  as  is  hardly  conceivable,  they  confined  themselves 
to  the  bare  statement  that  the  kingdom  was  at  hand, 
the  result  still  would  have  been  very  much  the  same. 


The  Kingdom  of  Heaven,  223 

For  both  the  kingdom  and  the  Messiahship  were  to  the 
Jewish  mind  indissolubly  bound  up  with  the  thought 
of  political  change,  and  if  Jesus'  purpose  was  to  rid  the 
ideal  of  the  kingdom  of  its  political  features,  the  worst 
thing  he  could  do  would  be  to  sow  broadcast  hopes 
which  only  would  stand  in  the  way  of  the  fulfilment 
of  his  designs.  Jesus  could  not  well  have  failed  to  see 
this,  and  if  in  spite  of  it  the  disciples  were  sent  out,  the 
easiest  explanation  is  that,  disappointed  at  his  slow 
progress,  he  had  determined  to  arouse  the  popular 
enthusiasm  and  to  make  use  of  it  to  promote  his  aims. 
But  this  it  is  hard  to  believe,  for  not  only  is  it  utterly 
opposed  to  the  view  of  the  kingdom  which  Jesus'  own 
words  make  it  almost  certain  that  he  held,  but  it  is 
opposed  to  the  fact  that  even  after  Jesus'  appearance 
at  Jerusalem  his  enemies  had  no  proof  that  he  claimed 
to  be  the  Messiah.  The  whole  incident  therefore,  we 
should  doubt,  even  if  we  had  no  other  reasons  to  ap- 
peal to  ;  but  other  reasons  are  by  no  means  lacking. 

If  we  examine  the  speech  which  is  attributed  to 
Jesus  on  this  occasion,  there  is  a  curious  thing  that 
will  be  noticed  about  it.  Of  all  the  sayings  of  which 
the  speech  is  made  up,  there  is  not  a  single  one  against 
which  plausible  objections  cannot  be  brought.  We  do 
not  mean  to  say  that  all  of  these  objections  are  equally 
strong,  or  that  by  themselves  the  sayings  might  not 
possibly  be  vindicated  for  Jesus  ;  only  when  we  find 
that  all  of  them  may  be  objected  to,  the  defence  that 
can  be  made  for  each  one  of  them  loses  something  of 
its  force.  If  we  take  the  speech  in  order,  first  there 
comes  the  injunction  not  to  preach  to  Gentiles  or 
Samaritans.  It  is  not  necessary  to  ask  here  whether 
this  is  consistent  with  Jesus'  own  views  ;  we  only  will 
suggest  that  the  injunction  is  not  likely  because  it  is 


224      ^/^^  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

useless.  The  disciples  never  would  have  thought  of 
doing  what  Jesus  commands  them  not  to  do  ;  that  they 
were  to  go  to  the  lost  sheep  of  the  house  of  Israel  would 
have  been  the  only  thing  that  would  have  entered  their 
minds.  On  the  contrary,  the  words  seem  to  imply  a 
time  when  missions  to  the  Gentiles  and  to  the  Samari- 
tans were  not  unheard  of,  or  else  the  prohibition  of 
them  seems  unintelligible,  not  the  time  of  Jesus  there- 
fore, but  later  times  after  the  Church  had  been  estab- 
lished. The  difficulty  of  the  announcement  which 
they  were  to  make  already  has  been  touched  upon. 
The  difficulty  vanishes  if  we  do  not  try  to  account  for 
the  narrative  as  a  real  event,  but  suppose  that,  when 
the  labors  of  the  Apostles  had  become  familiar,  this 
activity  of  theirs  was  carried  back  into  the  times  of 
Jesus,  and  they  were  thought  of  as  sent  out  by  Jesus 
to  preach  his  Messiahship,  just  as  they  really  did  go 
out  in  later  times.  And  then  an  ideal  speech  that 
suited  the  occasion  was  put  in  Jesus'  mouth,  as  in  the 
book  of  Acts  speeches  are  put  in  the  mouths  of  the 
Apostles. 

The  next  saying,  in  the  form  in  which  it  is  given  in 
Matthew,  is  clearly  an  impossibility  :  "  Heal  the  sick, 
cleanse  the  lepers,  raise  the  dead,  cast  out  demons." 
But  this  it  is  likely  is  not  the  original  form,  and  if  we 
drop  the  two  middle  clauses  we  shall  probably  have  the 
sentence  as  it  stood  at  first ;  for  this  is  all  that  the 
other  Evangelists  know  of,  the  healing  of  the  sick  and 
the  casting  out  of  demons.  But  even  in  this  simple 
form  the  saying  is  doubtful  enough,  for  we  have  al- 
ready shown  that  the  other  sayings  attributed  to  Jesus 
in  behalf  of  miracles  are  to  be  rejected.  And  it  is  very 
easy  to  see  how  a  later  writer,  who  believed  in  the 
Apostles'  miracles,   should  infer  that  the  power  had 


The  Kingdom  of  Heaven.  225 


been  formally  bestowed  upon  them  by  Jesus, — easier 
by  all  means  than  it  is  to  think  of  Jesus  as  really  doing 
this.  The  next  sentence  also  is  better  suited  to  later 
times  than  it  is  to  the  times  of  Jesus.  Certainly  this 
entire  absence  of  self-support  would  be  more  natural 
for  itinerant  teachers  in  communities  where  already 
there  were  Christian  families  to  aid  them,  than  it 
would  be  in  wholly  new  fields  ;  and  the  injunction 
which  comes  just  after,  to  seek  out  a  worthy  family  and 
there  abide,  also  suggests  this,  for  it  only  would  be 
with  a  co-religionist  that  a  stranger  could  count  so 
securely  on  a  continued  welcome.  Nor  is  this  anxiety 
that  the  disciples  should  be  supported  by  the  commu- 
nity, that  they  should  not  even  use  the  money  they 
possessed,  quite  worthy  of  Jesus ;  it  would  seem  to 
point  rather  to  a  time  when  the  support  of  itinerant 
preachers  had  become  an  ecclesiastical  question. 

Jesus  next  goes  on  to  give  directions  as  to  the  atti- 
tude which  the  disciples  are  to  bear  towards  their 
hearers.  These  directions  are  somewhat  trivial,  and 
are  scarcely  of  the  sort  which  one  would  suppose  the 
disciples  would  have  needed  most  ;  and  the  whole 
passage  does  not  impress  us  as  being  in  the  spirit  of 
Jesus.  Least  of  all  is  it  like  Jesus  to  encourage  the 
impatience  of  his  disciples,  to  tell  them  to  shake 
off  the  dust  of  their  feet  against  those  who  will 
not  hear  them ;  and  the  comparison  with  Sodom 
shocks  us  by  its  quite  uncalled-for  severity.  And 
indeed  this  saying  is  taken  from  another  dis- 
course by  Jesus,  from  the  woes  against  the  Gali- 
lean cities,  and  even  here  it  seems  to  have  been  added 
by  the  Evangelist,  to  correspond  with  the  saying 
which  goes  just  before,  "  It  shall  be  more  tolerable  for 
Tyre  and  Sidon  in  the  day  of  judgment  than  for  you." 


226       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  yesus. 

But  in  this  connection  the  severity  is  justified,  for 
Jesus  is  speaking  of  the  cities  to  which  he  had 
devoted  the  greater  part  of  his  ministry  ;  in  our  passage 
however  the  words  are  spoken  of  cities  which  only 
were  to  receive  a  flying  visit  from  a  disciple,  and 
which,  if  they  rejected  his  message,  did  not  by  any 
means  reject  the  truth  which  Chorazin  and  Caper- 
naum had  rejected.  But  this  is  easy  to  understand 
from  a  disciple  who  had  in  his  thoughts  a  rejection 
of  the  Gospel  which  had  followed  years  of  teaching 
by  the  Apostles.  And  pointing  to  the  same  thing  is 
the  impression  which  one  gets  from  our  passage  of  a 
more  extended  ministry  than  would  have  been  possible 
in  Jesus'  lifetime.  The  disciples  are  to  go  from  city  to 
city,  they  are  to  stay  in  each  till  their  message  has 
been  accepted  or  until  it  has  been  rejected.  But  this 
could  not  happen  all  at  once,  and  our  passage  implies 
as  much  when  it  assumes  that  the  disciples  will  be 
tempted  to  move  about  from  house  to  house.  Such  a 
prolonged  ministry  in  Jesus'  lifetime  is  unlikely  ;  what 
the  disciples  needed  was  not  practice  in  preaching  but 
the  companionship  of  Jesus,  and  an  opportunity  them- 
selves to  learn,  and  Jesus  hardly  would  have  ventured 
to  assign  them  such  an  errand  until  they  were  better 
prepared  for  it.  In  the  same  direction,  too,  points 
the  fact  that  they  are  warned  against  dangers,  they 
are  sent  out  as  sheep  into  the  midst  of  wolves.  But 
dangers  only  came  at  a  later  time,  and  Jesus  could  not 
have  anticipated  danger  in  such  a  mission  as  this. 
And  then  the  speech  closes  with  a  threat — Luke  prob- 
ably has  retained  this  more  correctly — "Whoso  re- 
ceiveth  you  receiveth  me,  and  whoso  rejecteth  you, 
rejecteth  me,  and  whoso  rejecteth  me  rejecteth  him 
that  sent  me."     Matthew  has  added  a  saying  peculiar 


i 


The  Kingdom  of  Heaven.  227 

to  himself,  and  he  has  made  the  whole  into  a  promise 
to  those  who  should  receive  the  disciples ;  but  the 
objection  to  this  is  that  the  promises  are  made  to 
persons  who  are  absent,  and  have  no  relation  to  the 
disciples,  to  whom  the  words  are  immediately  ad- 
dressed. And  this  last  sentence  also  calls  up  objec- 
tions ;  to  say  nothing  of  the  fact  that  it  implies  Jesus' 
relationship  to  God  in  a  way  in  which  Jesus  very 
seldom  speaks  of  it,  it  is  not  even  just,  for  it  is  not 
true  that  a  rejection  of  the  disciples  under  these  cir- 
cumstances would  in  any  sense  have  been  a  rejection 
of  the  truth  for  which  Jesus  stood. 

For  all  these  reasons  we  do  not  hesitate  to  reject  the 
whole  account,  and  still  less  do  we  hesitate  to  reject 
the  account  of  the  entry  into  Jerusalem.  This  too 
is  unintelligible  apart  from  some  political  aim.  What 
possible  pleasure  could  Jesus  take  in  the  shouts  of  a 
fanatical  rabble,  if  the  dignity  which  they  claimed  for 
him  was  something  utterly  opposed  to  what  he  was 
seeking  to  obtain  ?  Could  he  really  not  forego  the 
gratification  of  this  bit  of  triumph  under  false  pre- 
tences before  his  final  failure  ?  But  to  this  narrative 
the  same  objections  apply  which  applied  to  the  other  : 
it  is  not  like  Jesus,  and  it  would  have  put  an  end  to 
any  uncertainty  which  the  Pharisees  felt  about  his 
claims  to  the  Messiahship.  And  in  itself  the  narrative 
has  very  little  in  its  favor  :  the  miracle  with  which  it 
opens,  its  evident  and  minute  dependence  upon  the 
Old  Testament,  the  manifest  motive  there  was  for  it 
in  the  glorification  of  Jesus,  all  tell  against  it.  And 
probably  the  immediate  occasion  for  it  we  have  in  the 
words  with  which  Jesus  is  welcomed  by  the  multitude. 
Already  in  a  saying  which  had  been  attributed  to 
Jesus  he  had  said,  ' '  Ye  shall  not  see  me  until  ye  say, 


2  28        The  Life  and  Teachings  of  yesus. 

Blessed  is  he  that  cometh  in  the  name  of  the  Lord  ' '  ; 
and  now  that  he  actually  was  to  enter  the  city,  must 
not  the  people  have  met  him  with  these  words  ?  We 
find  therefore  no  reason  to  alter  the  opinion  which  we 
reached  before,  or  to  think  that  Jesus'  conception  of 
the  kingdom  had  in  it  the  smallest  political  element. 


CHAPTER  III. 

THE  MESSIAHSHIP  OF  JESUS. 

IN  the  conclusion  which  has  been  reached  about  the 
form  which  the  conception  of  the  kingdom  took  in 
Jesus'  mind,  a  good  deal  is  already  implied  with 
regard  to  the  idea  which  he  had  of  the  Messiah  of  that 
kingdom.  If  the  kingdom  is  a  purely  spiritual  one, 
a  kingdom  of  righteousness,  then  at  one  blow  all  the 
adventitious  dignity  of  the  popular  Messiah,  the  earthly 
glory,  the  seat  on  the  throne  of  David,  become  a  mat- 
ter of  perfect  indifference.  When  this  is  granted,  how- 
ever, there  still  is  a  considerable  amount  of  perplexity 
attaching  to  the  subject,  and  the  difficulty  may  be 
summed  up  with  sufficient  accuracy  in  the  two  ques- 
tions, What  part  did  Jesus'  Messiahship  play  in  his 
dealings  with  the  people  ?  and,  Just  how  did  it  present 
itself  to  his  own  consciousness,  and  how  did  he  speak 
of  it  in  his  communications  with  his  chosen  disciples  ? 
These  two  questions  play  into  each  other  more  or  less, 
and  the  answer  to  one  of  them  suggests  the  answer  to 
the  other,  but  nevertheless,  they  are  distinct  enough  to 
make  it  convenient  to  consider  them  apart. 

It  ordinarily  is  assumed  that  the  fact  of  Jesus' 
Messiahship  had  a  prominent  place,  if  not  the  most 
prominent,  in  his  own  consciousness,  and  that  the 

229 


230       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  fesus. 


recognition  of  this  Messiahship  was  the  objective 
point  towards  which  all  his  efforts  were  directed.  And 
undoubtedly  this  is  the  idea  which  is  present  in  our 
sources.  It  is  easj^  to  see  how  such  a  belief  got  to  pre- 
vail :  the  idea  of  Jesus  as  the  Messiah  was  the  central 
thing  in  the  preaching  of  the  Apostles,  among  whom 
Jesus'  conception  of  righteousness,  while  it  influenced 
their  lives  and  their  incidental  teachings  profoundly, 
never  was  able  to  assume  the  central  place  in  their 
theories  of  religion,  and  compete  in  the  line  of  doctrine 
and  theology  with  their  earlier  Jewish  conceptions  ; 
and  accordingly  it  would  seem  quite  natural  that  Jesus 
should  work  to  get  this  belief  fixed  in  the  people's 
minds,  that  he  should  send  his  disciples  out  to  spread 
it  everywhere  and  make  it  familiar,  and  should  encour- 
age it  wherever  it  appeared.  Nevertheless,  there  are 
serious  difiSculties  in  the  way  of  this  manner  of  con- 
ceiving Jesus'  ministry  which  have  not  always  been 
regarded.  It  is  certain  that  to  the  minds  of  the  people 
such  an  announcement  must  have  conveyed  a  notion 
which  differed  totally  from  that  which  Jesus  had  him- 
self, and  which  promoted  just  the  error  which  proved 
one  of  the  greatest  stumbling-blocks  in  his  ministry, 
and  against  which  he  had  constantly  to  be  fighting. 
Moreover,  it  is  idle  to  suppose  that  any  man  could 
have  been  the  centre  of  Messianic  hopes  for  so  long  a 
time,  and  still  have  aroused  no  sort  of  opposition  from 
the  watchful  Roman  authorities.  The  first  of  these 
difficulties  indeed  usually  receives  a  half-way  recogni- 
tion, but  the  attempt  to  mend  things  only  makes  the 
matter  worse.  In  order  to  harmonize  all  the  points  of 
view  which  make  their  appearance  in  the  Gospels, 
Jesus  is  made  to  blow  hot  and  cold  with  the  same 
breath ;  he  lets  the  belief  in  his  Messiahship  spread, 


The  Messiahs  hip  of  Jesus.  231 

and  then  tries  to  work  it  over  into  his  own  conception  ; 
he  thinks  to  avoid  the  compHcations  which  result 
simply  by  refusing  to  meet  the  advances  of  those  who 
want  to  see  him  accept  the  popular  role,  while  he  still 
insists  upon  the  fact  of  his  Messiahship  ;  by  turns  he 
tries  in  some  striking  way  to  stimulate  belief,  by  feed- 
ing men  miraculously,  by  riding  in  triumph  into  Jeru- 
salem, and  then  again,  to  vary  matters,  he  makes 
spasmodic  and  what  must  necessarily  be  quite  useless, 
efforts  to  stem  the  tide  by  forbidding  the  report  of 
something  which  might  seem  a  bid  for  popular  favor. 
But  such  a  veering  course  as  this  is  quite  inexplicable. 
If  belief  in  Jesus  as  the  popular  Messiah  had  been  only 
a  stepping-stone,  a  halting-place  on  the  road  to  the 
belief  which  Jesus  himself  wished  to  inspire,  then  the 
course  would  have  had  its  advantages ;  but  this  was 
not  the  case,  and  instead  of  being  a  help  to  him  it  was 
a  positive  hindrance  and  a  detriment.  What  Jesus  had 
to  do  then,  if  we  can  give  him  credit  for  a  very  moder- 
ate share  of  clear-sightedness,  was  to  avoid  arousing 
hopes  which  he  afterwards  would  have  to  be  to  the 
pains  of  extinguishing,  and  from  the  start  to  keep  the 
question  of  his  Messiahship  resolutely  in  the  back- 
ground until  men  were  ready  to  receive  it ;  there  was 
no  keeping  it  within  bounds,  if  once  it  were  allowed 
to  get  started  at  all.  This  then  is  what,  from  a  priori 
reasoning,  we  should  expect  Jesus  to  do,  and  that  he 
did  do  it  is  shown  by  the  best-attested  facts  in  the  Gos- 
pels. Of  course  there  are  plenty  of  statements  to  the 
contrary,  but  these  must  be  subjected  to  a  liberal  dis- 
count by  reason  of  the  obvious  influences  which  were 
at  hand  to  produce  them.  It  would  be  strange  indeed 
if  later  times  had  not  imported  something  of  its  own 
faith  into  Jesus'  words  and  acts.     And  it  is  to  be  no- 


232       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesics. 

ticed  that  by  far  the  greater  number  of  these  cases, 
where  Jesus  is  saluted  as  the  Messiah,  or  where  he  acts 
in  such  a  way  that  his  Messiahship  is  implied,  occur 
in  the  stories  of  miracles,  and  so  are  demonstrated  to 
be  of  later  origin.  On  the  other  hand,  there  is  to  start 
with  the  account  of  Peter's  confession  at  Csesarea 
Philippi,  which  is  of  capital  importance  on  the  ques- 
tion. Here  it  is  distinctly  implied  that  up  to  this  time 
the  people  had  not  thought  of  Jesus  as  the  Messiah, 
but  only  as  some  great  prophet ;  and  at  the  close  of 
the  account  again  Jesus  strictly  forbids  that  the  fact 
should  be  made  known.  To  this  narrative  we  shall 
have  occasion  to  return  again.  The  name  which  Jesus 
chooses  to  designate  himself  also  speaks  for  the  same 
conclusion.  It  is  still  an  unsettled  question  whether 
there  is  any  evidence  that  alread)?^  in  Jesus'  day  the 
term  "Son  of  man"  carried  any  Messianic  signifi- 
cance with  it,  and  in  the  absence  of  conclusive  proof 
to  the  contrary  the  testimony  of  the  Gospels  must  be 
accepted  as  decisive.  This  goes  strongly  against  any 
such  notion.  In  particular,  Jesus  never  could  have 
asked  the  question  of  his  disciples,  ' '  Whom  do  men 
say  that  the  Son  of  man  is  ?  "  and  have  followed  it  by 
the  second  question,  ' '  Whom  do  ye  say  that  I  am  ?  ' ' 
if  the  answer  already  was  contained  in  the  former 
phrase  ;  and  that  this  is  the  real  form  of  the  question 
is  indicated  by  Peter's  corresponding  phrase,  "  the  Son 
of  God,"  apparently  a  reference  to  it.  The  question 
is  a  harder  one  just  what  Jesus  himself  had  in  mind 
when  he  chose  the  phrase,  and  it  is  complicated  by  the 
fact  that  the  words  occur  so  often  in  very  doubtful  pas- 
sages. Most  of  these  passages  have  already-  received 
some  attention,  or  else  will  be  treated  of  before  we  are 
finished  ;  without,  therefore,  going  for  a  second  time 


The  Mcssiahship  of  Jesus.  233 

into  a  detailed  criticism,  it  will  be  enough  to  say  that 
there  are  only  five  places  in  our  opinion  where  the  words 
can  be  allowed  to  be  genuine.  One  of  these  is  the  case 
j  ust  mentioned  in  the  account  of  Peter' s  confession ;  then 
there  are  the  two  sayings,  ' '  The  Son  of  man  hath  not 
where  to  lay  his  head, ' '  and,  ' '  The  Son  of  man  came 
eating  and  drinking,"  and  perhaps  the  saying  about 
the  unpardonable  sin,  and  the  words  which  Jesus  is 
reported  to  have  spoken  at  his  trial.  Reasons  will  ap- 
pear in  another  chapter  why  we  do  not  think  it  prob- 
able the  phrase  was  taken  from  the  book  of  Daniel 
and  had  an  apocalyptic  sense  attached  to  it ;  it  will  be 
noticed  that  the  passages  we  have  quoted  none  of  them 
point  to  this,  not  the  last  one  even  when  the  true  read- 
ing is  retained. '  It  is  tempting,  when  one  remembers 
the  deep  human  sympathy  of  Jesus,  and  the  part  which 
it  played  in  the  consciousness  of  his  mission,  to  think 
that  this  must  in  some  way  have  lain  at  the  bottom  of 
his  choice  of  expression,  and  two  of  the  passages — 
the  others  do  not  give  any  clear  indication  one  way 
or  another — are  decidedly  in  favor  of  this  view.  Deeply 
impressed  with  the  sense  of  his  character  as  the  up- 
lifter  of  humanity,  it  would  be  very  natural  that  he 
should  catch  up  an  expression  which  seemed  to  give 
the  essence  of  his  mission  so  admirably,  and  which 
already  one  of  the  great  prophets  had  used  to  designate 
himself,  without  of  necessity  his  giving  any  special 
thought  to  what  the  elder  prophet  had  meant  by  it. 
And  at  any  rate  Ezekiel  is  the  most  obvious  source  to 
which  to  look  for  the  origin  of  the  phrase,  for  else- 
where it  is  by  no  means  so  prominent  as  it  is  in  Ezekiel, 
and  nowhere  else  is  it  applied,  as  Jesus  applies  it,  to 
a  definite  person.  The  fact  therefore,  to  repeat,  that 
'  Cf.  Luke  22 :  69. 


234        T^^^^  ^if^  ^^^^  Teachings  of  Jestis. 

Jesus  chose  such  a  term,  and  not  one  which  pointed 
clearly  to  a  Messianic  dignity,  shows  that  he  did  not 
wish  to  insist  upon  that  dignity.  Two  or  three  other 
indications  also  may  be  briefly  mentioned.  Jesus  does 
on  one  occasion  speak  to  the  people  directly  about  the 
Messiah,  but  it  is  to  show  them  how  utterly  their  con- 
ception is  in  the  wrong.  If  Christ  is  David's  son, 
how  then  doth  David  in  spirit  call  him  I^rd,  saying, 
The  lyord  said  unto  my  Lord,  Sit  thou  on  my  right 
hand,  until  I  make  thine  enemies  thy  footstool  ?  Could 
they  not  see  that  if  the  Messiah's  dignity  was  just 
what  David's  dignity  had  been,  the  leadership  of  a 
material  kingdom,  David  and  the  Messiah  were  ex- 
actly on  a  level  ?  it  was  only  if  the  Messianic  dignity 
was  something  higher  than  this,  something  in  a 
difierent  realm,  that  David  could  call  him  lyord.  But 
here,  unless  the  impression  which  the  narrative  makes 
upon  us  is  totally  out  of  the  way,  there  appears  no 
consciousness  that  the  people  were  likely  to  apply  this 
to  himself ;  he  speaks  of  the  Messiah  and  of  theories 
about  the  Messiah  in  a  much  more  impersonal  way 
than  he  could  have  done  if  he  himself  had  been  a 
prominent  candidate  before  the  people.  Then  again 
in  another  passage  Jesus'  opponents  ask  him  what 
authority  he  has  for  certain  acts  of  his.  The  very 
question  shows  that  Jesus  had  not  appeared  in  the 
character  of  Messiah,  for  in  that  case  the  authority 
which  he  claimed  would  have  been  evident.  And  in 
his  answer  too  he  does  not  make  this  claim  ;  he  declares 
that  his  authority  rests  upon  the  plane  on  which  John's 
rested,  the  authority  of  truth  everywhere  against  error 
and  falsehood,  and  that,  if  they  will  not  recognize  such 
authority,  he  has  none  of  the  palpable  evidence  which 
they  demand.     And  of  some  weight  too  is  the  fact  that 


The  Messiah  ship  of  Jesus,  235 

when  Jesus'  enemies  finally  set  about  his  destruction 
and  tried  to  involve  him  in  political  complications, 
they  found  it  impossible  to  get  hold  of  any  proof 
against  him. 

According  to  the  Gospels,  just  before  Jesus  was  put 
to  death,  when  he  was  undergoing  his  trial,  he  did  de- 
clare openly  to  his  judges  the  truth  of  what  they  were 
trying  to  establish  against  him.  It  is  not  clear  how 
much  authority  can  be  given  to  this  statement,  but 
there  is  nothing  very  improbable  about  it.  Jesus  saw 
that  his  death  was  determined  on,  and  his  words  no 
longer  could  arouse  false  expectations  ;  to  refuse  now 
to  speak  might  seem  to  him  cowardice  rather  than 
prudence.  But  this  implies  that  in  a  real  sense  Jesus 
did  look  upon  himself  as  the  Messiah,  and  we  may 
now  turn  to  the  more  important  question  as  to  just 
what  emphasis  he  put  upon  the  fact  in  his  own  mind. 
For  the  most  part  the  belief  prevails  that  he  brought 
it  very  emphatically  to  the  foreground,  that  he  made 
altogether  startling  claims  for  himself  and  placed  his 
own  person  at  the  centre  of  his  doctrine.  We  have 
already  indicated  our  belief  that  this  is  overdrawn, 
that  Jesus'  idea  of  himself  as  the  Messiah  was 
thoroughly  tributary  to  his  conception  of  the  kingdom, 
and  that  it  only  was  the  perception  of  the  people's 
need,  and  of  his  own  ability  to  satisfy  this  need,  which 
clothed  itself  in  the  garb  which  it  naturally  would  take 
on  in  a  Jewish  mind,  the  belief  that  he  was  the 
bringer  of  the  only  true  salvation  to  his  people,  and 
therefore  the  Messiah.  Now  the  very  fact  that  the 
kingdom  of  heaven  had  such  a  supreme  value  in  Jesus' 
mind,  and  the  way  in  which  it  is  the  kingdom  and  the 
kingdom  alone  which  is  insisted  on  in  the  greater 
number  of  his  sayings,  makes  it  unlikely  that  he  di- 


236        The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

vided  his  allegiance  between  two  not  very  closely  con- 
nected doctrines.  And  again  the  narrative  of  the  day 
at  Csesarea  Philippi  bears  this  out.  Doubts  have  been 
raised  as  to  the  genuineness  of  this  account,  but 
they  do  not  seem  to  us  to  be  well  founded.  It 
seems  certainly  to  have  been  present  in  the  earliest 
source.  Mark,  it  is  true,  and  following  him  Luke, 
omit  Jesus'  words,  but  the  narrative  which  they  do 
have  has  all  the  marks  of  an  abridgment.  Apart 
from  Jesus'  words  Peter's  statement  ceases  in  large 
measure  to  be  intelligible,  and  in  its  brevity  and 
terseness  gives  no  hint  that  the  event  was  one  of  cap- 
ital importance  in  Jesus'  life.  Since  therefore  Mark 
makes  of  it  the  crisis  in  the  development  of  his  plot, 
and  since  Mark,  even  when  he  is  the  freest,  seldom 
is  without  some  basis  in  his  source  for  his  more  im- 
portant conceptions,  it  is  probable  that  he  had  the 
longer  and  more  intelligible  form  before  him.  And 
in  this  way  it  is  easily  explained  how,  with  no  sound 
tradition  to  back  him,  he  comes  so  near  to  being  right 
in  his  general  conception  of  Jesus'  Messianic  relations 
with  the  people.  Moreover,  he  uses  the  opening  sen- 
tences of  the  narrative  in  another  story  of  his  own," 
and  when  he  does  this  it  usually  is  with  material  which 
he  gets  out  of  his  source.  But  this  would  make  the 
origin  of  the  passage  much  too  early  to  let  it  be  ex- 
plained as  due  to  Roman  influence,  and  this  is  the  only 
natural  explanation  of  it  if  it  is  not  genuine.  But 
there  really  is  no  need  to  suspect  the  story,  for  it  fits 
in  unobtrusively  with  what  we  have  shown  was  the 
general  position  which  Jesus  took.  l/joked  at  as  in  fact 
the  words  of  Jesus,  the  passage  makes  it  plain  that  not 
even  to  the  disciples  had  Jesus  spoken  of  himself  as 
'  Mk.  6 :  14-16. 


The  MessiahsJiip  of  Jesus.  237 

the  Messiah,  but  that  he  had  been  waiting  till  it  should 
be  no  external  information  to  them,  but  they  should 
be  read}'  to  see  it  with  their  own  eyes,  and  to  under- 
stand it  something  as  he  did  himself.  It  is  only  as 
a  first  confession  that  the  solemn  joy  of  Jesus  can  be 
understood.  No  flesh  and  blood  could  reveal  it 
to  them,  but  only  the  Father  in  heaven.  Up  to  this 
time  therefore  Jesus  had  been  to  them  only  the  Son  of 
man  ;  he  had  not  been  willing  to  force  by  any  artificial 
process  a  higher  faith  in  him,  although  he  had  been 
working  and  hoping  that  this  might  come  about. 
And  now  in  fear  and  trembling  he  puts  the  question 
which  shall  show  whether  or  no  he  has  succeeded,  and 
he  finds  that  Peter  at  least  has  learned  the  lesson. 
But  with  all  this  it  is  the  kingdom,  and  not  his  own 
position  which  is  the  great  thing  to  him.  The  joy 
that  Jesus  showed  at  Peter's  confession  was  due,  not 
to  the  recognition  of  his  own  dignity,  but  to  the  fact 
that  this  recognition  revealed  a  dawning  sense  of  what 
the  kingdom  really  was.  Peter  had  been  able  to  see 
the  head  of  that  kingdom,  not  in  a  prince  of  the  house 
of  David,  but  in  a  simple  teacher  of  righteousness. 
And  the  way  in  which  Jesus  goes  on  to  speak  is  the 
proof  of  this.  For  the  reason  that  he  gives  for  the  joy 
he  has  just  expressed  is  that  now  at  last  the  success  of 
the  kingdom  is  assured.  Jesus  already  saw  that  to  him 
the  full  assurance  of  victory  was  not  to  be  given, 
he  was  to  set  in  motion  the  conflict,  and  that  was  all ; 
and  if  he  were  to  die  with  his  message  still  not  under- 
stood, everything  would  have  been  thrown  away. 
But  now  that  Peter  once  had  taken  the  decisive  step 
and  had  gotten  a  glimpse,  though  ever  so  slight  a  one, 
of  Jesus'  meaning,  the  truth  would  care  for  its  own, 
and  the  kingdom  must  conquer  in  the  end,  though  the 


238        The  Life  a7id  Teachings  of  Jesus. 


very  gates  of  Hades  should  oppose  it.  Peter  was  the 
first,  but  he  was  the  promise  of  all  the  great  assembly 
of  the  future.  Just  what  form  the  new  movement 
was  to  take,  what  its  outward  organization  was  to  be, 
or  whether  it  was  to  be  organized  at  all,  Jesus  could 
leave  for  the  disciples  themselves  to  work  out  as  their 
own  needs  and  circumstances  should  prompt  them ; 
he  was  satisfied  if  he  could  get  firmly  settled  in  them 
the  living  principle  of  truth. 

The  conception  of  Jesus'  Messiahship  was  therefore 
in  his  own  mind  distinctly  subordinate  to  the  concep- 
tion of  the  kingdom  of  heaven.  Nevertheless  it  would 
be  a  mistake  to  minimize  this  element  of  his  doctrine, 
and  there  seems  to  be  evidence  to  show  that  Jesus 
really  did  claim  for  himself  a  position  which  at  the 
least  was  unique.  A  distinction  must  be  made  how- 
ever between  the  claims  which  Jesus  makes  to  the 
people  and  those  which  he  makes  to  the  inner  and 
more  intimate  circle  of  his  disciples.  It  does  not 
appear  that  in  speaking  to  the  people  Jesus  assumed 
a  much  greater  authority  than  any  bold  and  earnest 
prophet  might  have  done,  and  the  passages  which 
seems  to  go  against  this  will  not  stand  a  critical  scru- 
tiny. The  claim  to  forgive  sins  already  drops  away 
with  the  miracle  to  which  it  is  attached.  The  similar 
claim  to  be  I^ord  of  the  Sabbath  is  less  suspicious,  and 
might  without  very  great  difl&culty  be  made  out  to  be 
in  harmony  with  Jesus'  attitude  ;  but  the  ease  with 
which  an  Evangelist  in  telling  of  the  incident  might 
draw  the  conclusion  ' '  The  Son  of  man  is  L<ord  even 
of  the  Sabbath,"  and  the  unlikelihood  that  Jesus,  in 
arguing  with  enemies,  should  have  irritated  them  by  a 
useless  and  quite  anomalous  appeal  to  his  own  personal 
authority,   which  was    precisely  what  they  did  not 


The  Messiahship  of  Jesus.  239 

recognize,  debars  us  from  allowing  any  value  to  the 
saying.  Connected  with  this  there  is  the  somewhat 
similar  saying  found  only  in  Matthew,  in  which  Jesus 
speaks  of  himself  as  greater  than  the  Temple,  and 
which  probably  is  one  of  Matthew's  own  additions. 
This  has  the  same  objection  to  it  as  the  last,  and  both 
moreover  are  precluded  by  the  fact  that  they  bring 
confusion  into  Jesus'  argument.  Jesus  wishes  to  show 
that  the  accusation  which  the  Pharisees  bring  against 
his  disciples  is  based  upon  no  essential  principle  of 
right  and  wrong,  and  he  does  this,  as  his  custom  is, 
by  appealing  to  the  I/aw  which  they  all  recognize.  He 
only  weakens  and  obscures  this  if  he  goes  on  to  say, 
At  any  rate  I  claim  the  authority  to  make  what  rules 
I  please  about  the  Sabbath,  or,  Since  the  priests  have 
the  right  to  perform  their  sacred  duties  in  the  Temple 
on  the  Sabbath,  and  I  am  greater  than  the  Temple, 
those  who  are  connected  with  my  person  have  also 
special  privileges.  Neither  of  these  are  arguments, 
for  they  go  on  premises  which  are  not  admitted  ;  and 
in  the  last  one  there  is  really  no  analogy  between  satis- 
fying one's  own  needs  and  carrying  on  the  ritual  of  wor- 
ship. The  most  striking  saying  which  we  have  left  is 
that  in  which  Jesus  compares  himself  to  Solomon  and 
Jonah,  and  asserts  his  superiority  to  both.  But  while 
he  always  speaks  with  authority  it  is  seldom  that  he 
puts  his  authority  forward  so  prominently  as  he  does 
here.  When  he  is  talking  with  his  disciples,  however, 
the  case  is  somewhat  different,  and  there  can  be  little 
doubt  that  he  speaks  with  a  self-confidence  which  at 
times  is  almost  startling  ;  though  of  course  not  all  that 
is  attributed  to  him  can  be  relied  on.  The  baptismal 
formula  which  is  put  in  his  mouth  would  have  to  be 
rejected  even  if  it  were  not  represented  as  being  spoken 


240        The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 


after  his  resurrection,  for  it  clearly  shows  the  influence 
of  dogma  ;  and  the  promise  to  be  continually  in  the 
midst  of  his  disciples  to  answer  prayer  is  an  amplifica- 
tion of  a  saying  which  we  still  have  nearer  in  its 
original  form  in  Mark. '  Moreover,  the  saying  which 
Matthew  records,  "  He  that  loveth  father  or  mother 
more  than  me  is  not  worthy  of  me, ' '  probably  must  give 
place  to  the  form  as  it  appears  in  I<uke,  "  If  any  man 
Cometh  to  me,  and  hateth  not  his  father  and  mother, 
he  cannot  be  my  disciple  "  ;  for  the  saying  stands  at 
the  head  of  a  discourse,  where  the  latter  form  is  less 
abrupt.  And  between  the  phrases  ' '  for  my  sake  ' '  and 
"for  the  kingdom  of  heaven's  sake,"  both  of  which 
are  found,  the  choice  is  doubtful,  with  perhaps  an 
advantage  in  favor  of  the  latter.  Nevertheless  with 
no  uncertain  voice  Jesus  proclaims  himself  their  I^ord 
and  Master,  above  whom  the  disciple  cannot  rise,  he 
commands  with  all  the  authority  of  an  "  I  say  unto 
you,"  prophets  and  kings  have  looked  forward  to  his 
day,  to  confess  him  is  to  be  confessed  before  the  Father. 
Doubtless  this  was  due  in  part  to  a  perception  of  how 
vast  an  incentive  personal  love  and  devotion  must 
prove  in  the  disciples'  lives,  but  it  was  also  more  than 
this.  The  very  fact  that  with  such  confidence  Jesus 
could  have  felt  himself  the  Messiah  of  an  ideal  so 
lofty  and  deep-reaching  as  his  own,  which  made  the 
little  ones  of  the  new  kingdom  greater  than  the 
greatest  who  had  gone  before,  is  proof  positive  of  a 
conviction  that  his  was  a  relationship  to  God  and  men 
above  that  which  other  men  had  found  it  possible  to 
attain.  But  this  greatness  is  no  external  one,  it  is  a 
greatness  which  belongs  to  service,  and  which  gives 
him  no  privileges  above  his  fellows  ;  in  particular  it  is 
'  Matt.  18  :  19-20;  cf.  Mk.  11 :  24. 


The  Messiahship  of  Jesus.  241 

a  greatness  which  rests  upon  the  greatness  of  the  truth 
which  has  been  revealed  to  him.  It  is  to  this  that  Jesus 
points  in  the  passage  which  marks  his  Messianic  con- 
sciousness at  its  highest.  "  I  thank  thee,  O  Father, 
lyord  of  heaven  and  earth,  that  thou  didst  hide  these 
things  from  the  wise  and  understanding,  and  didst 
reveal  them  unto  babes  :  yea,  Father  ;  for  so  it  was 
well  pleasing  in  thy  sight.  All  things  have  been 
delivered  unto  me  of  my  Father  :  and  no  one  knoweth 
the  Son  save  the  Father  ;  neither  doth  any  know  the 
Father  save  the  Son,  and  he  to  whomsoever  the  Son 
willeth  to  reveal  him.  Come  unto  me,  all  ye  that 
labor  and  are  heavy  laden,  and  I  will  give  you  rest. 
Take  my  yoke  upon  you,  and  learn  of  me  ;  for  I  am 
meek  and  lowly  in  heart  :  and  ye  shall  find  rest  imto 
your  souls.  For  my  yoke  is  easy,  and  my  burden  is 
light. ' '  The  passage  is  unique  among  Jesus'  sayings, 
and  yet  we  do  not  think  that  there  is  any  sufficient 
reasons  to  doubt  that  Jesus  really  spoke  it.  The 
knowledge  that  in  the  midst  of  loneliness  and  mis- 
understanding and  the  heartsickness  of  failure,  God 
knew  the  truth  of  him  and  had  marked  him  for  his 
own,  the  consciousness  that  he  was  permitted  to  stand 
in  a  special  relation  to  the  Father,  and  that  to  him 
God  had  been  revealed  as  he  had  not  revealed  himself 
to  any  other  man,  that  this  revelation  was  a  message  of 
infinite  love  and  compassion  to  weary  and  burdened 
men,  which  he  alone  was  able  to  make  real  to  them, 
this  is  what  gave  Jesus  his  divine  confidence.  From 
another  man  words  like  these  would  sound  strange 
and  boastful ;  from  the  lips  of  Jesus  they  come  to  us 

naturally,  because  of  Jesus  they  are  true. 
16 


CHAPTER  IV. 


JESUS'    ATTITUDE  TOWARDS  THE  I<AW. 


OF  the  general  attitude  which  Jesus  held  towards 
the  Mosaic  law  and  the  religion  of  the  Old  Tes- 
tament there  can  be  no  reasonable  doubt.  Jesus 
certainly  believed  that  the  Old  Testament  furnished  a 
revelation  of  God's  will,  and  upon  it  his  own  spiritual 
life  had  been  nourished.  There  is  no  evidence  that 
upon  critical  questions  which  concern  the  Old  Testa- 
ment he  held  views  which  differed  from  those  views 
which  his  contemporaries  held  ;  critical  questions  one 
might  say  indeed  would  have  had  very  little  attraction 
to  him.  He  reveres  the  Temple  with  all  its  associa- 
tions ;  he  recognizes  sacrifice  as  one  way  of  paying 
worship  to  God  ;  he  does  not  blame  the  Pharisees  be- 
cause of  the  attention  which  they  paid  to  the  lesser 
matters  of  the  lyaw,  but  because  they  neglected  what 
was  weightier ;  there  is  one  who  is  good,  he  says,  and 
therefore,  in  having  his  law  the  way  to  eternal  life  is 
already  given  :  so  much  we  may  agree  to  without  hesi- 
tation. 

But  this,  after  all  has  been  said,  really  tells  very 
little  indeed,  for  whatever  at  bottom  Jesus'  attitude 
had  been,  this  in  any  case  would  have  been  true.  If 
Jesus  had  possessed  the  reforming  spirit,   if  he  had 

242 


yesus  Attitude  towards  the  Law.        243 

been  fond  of  attacking  errors  and  correcting  misap- 
prehensions, the  case  would  have  been  different ;  but 
the  spirit  of  iconoclasm  was  least  of  all  congenial  to 
Jesus,  who  cared  most  to  insist  upon  positive  truth. 
Instead  of  overthrowing  old  institutions,  and  thus  run- 
ning the  risk  that  men  would  lose  the  elements  of 
truth  which  these  institutions  contained,  he  set  himself 
to  introduce,  wherever  he  was  able,  a  higher  view, 
which,  as  soon  as  it  was  mastered,  should  leave  the  old 
one  to  fall  away  of  itself.  If,  therefore,  Jesus  had 
looked  upon  the  Mosaic  law  as  something  temporary 
and  unessential,  we  should  not  have  expected  him  to 
state  this  plainly  ;  the  age  was  not  ready  for  such  a 
statement,  and  his  disciples  were  not  ready  for  it,  and 
he  only  could  give  to  them  principles  which  afterwards 
they  might  carry  out  for  themselves.  Nor  is  it  quite 
right  to  speak  of  this  as  an  accommodation  to  the  dis- 
ciples' views.  Jesus'  reverence  for  the  old  religion  and 
his  recognition  of  its  divine  character  would  be  per- 
fectly sincere,  and  he  only  would  not  insist  upon  what 
he  thought  would  for  the  present  do  more  harm  than 
good.  And  this,  if  it  had  been  Jesus'  attitude,  we  now 
are  in  a  position  to  see  would  have  been  the  only  thing 
for  him  to  do.  One  cannot  teach  truth  by  stating  it  in  so 
many  words  ;  such  a  statement  is  worse  than  useless  un- 
less the  hearer  can  be  made  to  see  the  basis  upon  which 
the  truth  rests,  the  reason  for  it.  And  how  impossible  it 
would  have  been  to  make  the  disciples  understand  this, 
we  can  guess  from  the  fact  that  even  that  which  formed 
the  centre  of  Jesus'  teaching  and  which  continually  he 
was  insisting  on,  the  kingdom  of  heaven  as  a  kingdom 
of  righteousness,  the  disciples  never  more  than  half 
understood. 
The  great  mistake  of  later  Judaism  lay  in  the  fact 


244        ^^  ^if^  ^^^^  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

that  it  was  a  religion  based  almost  wholly  upon  an  out- 
ward revelation  in  the  past,  the  religion  of  a  book. 
God,  it  was  thought,  had  given  a  certain  number  of 
rules  which  men  were  to  observe,  not  because  there 
was  anything  in  the  rules  themselves  which  claimed 
their  obedience,  but  because  God  had  commanded 
them ;  and  in  this  Law  religion  was  contained.  It  was 
not  until  comparatively  late  times  that  the  elaboration 
of  these  rules  reached  such  a  height  that  they  became 
an  intolerable  burden  ;  then  the  scribes,  by  an  endless 
hair-splitting,  had  drawn  from  the  more  general  com- 
mands in  the  Old  Testament  applications  to  almost 
every  conceivable  case,  and  each  of  these  was  just  as 
binding  as  if  it  had  been  expressly  stated  in  the  Law. 
But  we  must  not  overlook  the  fact  that  the  same  thing 
was  to  be  found  in  the  Old  Testament  itself,  although 
there  it  was  not  yoX.  carried  to  such  absurd  lengths. 
The  ritual  legislation,  the  distinction  between  what 
was  clean  and  what  was  not  clean,  were  already  laid 
down  in  the  Law  with  wearisome  detail,  and  were  rec- 
ognized as  binding  in  just  the  same  degree  as  the  moral 
requirements.  And  the  casuistry  of  later  times  was  a 
necessary  result  of  this,  for  puzzling  cases  must  con- 
stantly be  arising,  and  then  men  had  to  have  some  rule 
to  follow.  Doubtless  this  strictness  in  guarding  the 
Law  was  not  without  its  advantages,  but  the  essential 
defect  of  it  all,  as  we  have  said,  was  the  attempt  to 
make  religion  depend  upon  external  authority.  God, 
it  was  thought,  might  command  what  he  pleased,  and 
that  the  rules  were  quite  arbitrary,  that  they  had  no 
moral  quality  in  the  least,  counted  for  nothing  against 
the  fact  that  God  had  commanded  them.  To  abstain 
from  pork  was  just  as  much  a  command  of  God  as  to 
abstain  from  murder,  and  from  this  the  step  was  not  a 


yesMS  Attitude  towards  the  Law.        245 

very  long  one  that  the  one  was  as  important  as  the 
other  ;  it  was  a  mistake  which  the  prophets  had  fore- 
seen, and  into  which  the  nation  as  a  whole  gradually 
but  surely  fell.  What  right  had  men  to  make  any  dis- 
tinction between  God's  commands?  Were  they  not 
all  equally  important  ?  And  so  the  distinction  between 
moral  duties  and  ritual  duties  grew  weaker  and 
weaker.  Injustice  would  tend  to  become  a  crime,  not 
because  it  was  unjust,  but  because  it  was  forbidden  ; 
and  consequently,  if  one  could  be  unjust,  and  still 
could  keep  within  the  letter  of  the  law,  he  had  nothing 
to  fear.  And  it  was  just  to  this  that  Judaism  came. 
The  letter  of  the  I^aw  was  everything,  the  spirit  very 
little  ;  men  might  seize  upon  the  pretext  of  a  religious 
duty  to  neglect  the  duty  which  they  owed  their  par- 
ents. And  quite  as  naturally  was  the  Pharisaic  self- 
sufficiency,  his  utter  lack  of  humility  and  of  sympathy 
with  his  fellows,  the  result  of  this  tendency.  When 
duty  is  made  a  matter  of  the  heart  no  man  is  likely  to 
come  so  close  to  his  ideal  that  he  is  greatly  inclined  to 
pride  himself  upon  his  attainments.  But  with  the 
Pharisees  religious  duty  was  a  perfectly  definite  thing, 
not  too  far  out  of  the  reach  of  a  careful  man.  He  was 
not  to  commit  murder — well,  that  was  not  a  very  hard 
task  :  angry  thoughts  he  did  not  concern  himself  much 
about.  He  had  certain  definite  things  to  avoid,  cer- 
tain definite  washings  and  sacrifices  to  go  through,  and 
every  now  and  then  he  might  well  look  back  upon  a 
day  in  which  he  had  walked  with  well-nigh  perfect 
uprightness. 

Now  was  this  in  any  way  Jesus'  attitude  towards 
the  I^aw  ?  did  he  think  of  the  I^aw  as  something  which 
in  its  smallest  prescriptions  was  of  divine  authority, 
which  in  its  ritual  was  always  to  be  binding  upon  the 


246        The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 


citizens  of  the  new  kingdom  ?  As  has  been  said  al- 
ready, we  cannot  expect  that  Jesus  will  answer  this 
question  directl)-,  and  we  only  can  judge  of  what  his 
answer  would  be  by  the  indications  which  he  lets  fall. 
And  to  begin  with,  Jesus  does  not  speak  of  his  teach- 
ing as  the  revival  of  old  truth  which  had  become 
neglected,  he  speaks  of  it  as  something  new.  It  is 
new  wine  that  cannot  be  contained  in  old  bottles  ;  the 
personal  element  in  his  teaching — I  say  unto  you — he 
constantly  is  making  prominent ;  the  scribe  who  is  in- 
structed into  the  kingdom  is  neither  to  neglect  the 
former  things  nor  to  make  them  all-important,  he  is 
to  bring  forth  from  his  store-house  things  new  and  old. 
Now  this,  by  itself,  if  we  consider  it,  is  really  a  setting 
aside  of  the  old  point  of  view  ;  the  Law  no  longer  is 
the  perfect  standard,  and  instead  of  being  judged  by 
it,  Jesus  judges  the  I^aw.  The  one  who  is  but  little  in 
the  kingdom  which  Jesus  announces  is  greater  than 
the  greatest  who  came  before  him,  greater,  therefore, 
than  Moses  himself,  who  gave  the  Law.  And  this 
principle  Jesus  does  not  hesitate  to  put  in  practice. 
The  Law  grants  divorce,  Jesus  says  that  divorce  is 
not  to  be  granted  ;  the  Law  permits  retaliation,  and 
Jesus  forbids  it  :  the  authority,  the  perfect  straight- 
forw^ardness  with  which  Jesus  does  this,  shows  that 
however  sacred  the  Law  was  to  him,  it  was  not  the 
simple  fact  that  a  command  was  in  the  Law  which 
made  it  sacred,  but  that  he  had  a  standard  by  which 
even  the  Law  was  to  be  measured.  And  still  more  sig- 
nificant is  the  silence  of  Jesus.  In  Jesus'  controversies 
with  the  Pharisees  he  once  or  twice  directly  opposes  a 
precept  of  the  Law,  but  ordinarily  he  does  not  do  this. 
On  the  contrary,  he  opposes  the  law  to  the  later  tra- 
dition, which  the  Pharisees  observed,  and  even  when 


yesus  Attitude  towards  the  Law.         247 

he  is  arguing  against  divorce,  he  does  this  by  an  ap- 
peal to  another  passage  in  the  Law.  But  while  in  this 
Jesus  seems  to  argue  as  the  scribes  might  have  argued, 
it  is  remarkable  that  he  never  appeals  to  anything 
which  does  not  have  a  direct  moral  significance,  and 
which  does  not  carry  its  own  authority  with  it.  This 
is  indeed  the  value  which  expressly  he  sets  upon  the 
Old  Testament,  its  power  for  righteousness.  Whatso- 
ever ye  would  that  men  should  do  to  you,  do  ye  even 
so  to  them, — this  is  to  him  the  I^aw  and  the  prophets. 
That  which  sums  up  everything  is  love  to  God  and 
love  to  one's  neighbor  ;  judgment,  mercy,  truth,  these 
are  the  weightier  matters  of  the  Law.  And  the  utter 
absence  of  any  reference  to  circumcision,  to  the  per- 
formance of  ritual  duties,  is  really  decisive  against 
them.  If,  when  other  men  were  insisting  upon  these, 
Jesus  planted  himself  squarely  upon  righteousness, 
and  made  righteousness  the  sole  condition,  we  hardly 
can  think  that  it  was  an  oversight  on  Jesus'  part,  or 
that  he  did  not  see  the  bearing  of  his  own  teachings. 
And  fortunately  we  have  several  instances  where,  in 
a  less  general  way,  Jesus  shows  what  his  real  attitude 
was,  and  first  is  his  teaching  in  reference  to  the  Sab- 
bath. Jesus'  argument  was  directed  against  Rabbinical 
subtilties,  and  it  had  no  direct  reference  to  the  Old 
Testament  at  all  ;  but  really  it  tells  nearly  as  strongly 
against  the  priestly  views  of  the  Sabbath  which  we 
find  in  the  Old  Testament,  as  it  does  against  the 
Rabbis.  And  that  Jesus  was  not  unaware  of  this,  we 
might  gather  from  the  illustration  which  he  gives 
about  the  shew-bread.  "  Have  ye  not  read  what  David 
did,  when  he  was  an  hungred,  and  they  that  were  with 
him  ;  how  he  entered  into  the  house  of  God,  and  did 
eat  the  shew-bread,  which  it  was  not  lawful  for  him  to 


248       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

eat,  neither  for  them  that  were  with  him,  but  only  for 
the  priests  ?  ' '  Here  certainly  it  is  a  violation  of  the 
Law  which  Jesus  justifies,  and  if  this  illustration 
proves  that  the  Rabbinical  rule  may  be  broken,  it 
proves  just  as  clearly  that  the  rule  about  shew-bread 
may  be  broken  also  without  oflfence  to  God,  The  argu- 
ment can  scarcely  be  simply  that  in  a  case  of  great 
necessity  God's  commandment  may  be  overborne. 
This  of  itself  would  compel  one  to  go  further  and  to 
make  distinctions,  for  surely  Jesus  never  would  have 
justified  this  in  the  case  of  the  "  weightier  matters  "  of 
the  Law  ;  and  besides,  in  this  case,  the  need  of  the 
disciples  seems  by  no  means  to  have  been  great,  and  so 
such  a  consideration  would  not  be  suggested  b}^  the 
incident.  Really  it  seems  to  lead  to  this,  that  require- 
ments of  this  sort  which  have  no  moral  significance, 
cannot  be  the  immutable,  the  eternal  will  of  God,  and 
so  cannot  have  that  sanction  which  the  Pharisees  as- 
serted. We  might  appeal  also  to  the  way  in  which 
Jesus  bases  forgiveness  of  sins  altogether  upon  moral 
grounds,  without  any  reference  to  offerings  or  sacri- 
fices. But  what  is  most  decisive  is  the  attitude  which 
he  shows  towards  ceremonial  cleanness.  ' '  There  is 
nothing,"  he  says,  "  from  without  that  entering  into  a 
man  can  defile  him,  but  the  things  which  come  out 
firom  a  man,  these  defile  the  man."  Here,  too,  the 
argument  is  directed  in  the  first  place  against  the  tra- 
ditional additions  to  the  Law,  and  we  may  doubt 
whether  the  explanation  of  the  saying  which  the  Gos- 
pels give  really  came  from  Jesus.  But  there  can  be  no 
doubt  that  the  explanation  is  the  true  one,  and  what- 
ever Jesus'  reference  may  have  been,  the  argument 
applies  just  as  decisively  to  the  Old  Testament  regula- 
tions with  regard  to  clean  and  unclean  food.     Did 


Jesus  Attitude  towards  the  Law.        249 

Jesus,  with  all  his  clear-sightedness,  fail  to  see  this? 
did  he  think  that  the  principle  which  he  sets  down 
clearly  and  without  limitation  applies  to  the  traditions 
of  the  Rabbis,  and  ceases  to  apply  when  it  come  in 
contact  with  the  Law  ?  if  Jesus  fails  to  make  this  dis- 
tinction for  himself,  we  do  not  feel  justified  in  making 
it  for  him. 

Taken  altogether,  these  indications  give  a  pretty 
clear  account  of  what  Jesus'  position  was.  There  are 
three  attitudes,  any  one  of  which  it  is  conceivable  he 
might  have  taken.  He  might  have  set  everything  in 
the  Law  squarely  on  the  same  basis,  so  far  as  its  obli- 
gatoriness went,  or  he  might  have  put  the  supreme  value 
of  the  Law  on  its  power  for  righteousness.  And  in 
this  latter  case  again,  he  might  or  he  might  not  have 
recognized  all  that  his  position  implied.  For  since  the 
Law  does  actually  consist  of  a  mixture  of  absolute 
principles  with  much  that  is  arbitrary  and  that  has 
very  little  to  do  with  righteousness,  it  would  be  quite 
possible  for  one,  taking  only  the  grand  sweep  of  the 
book  into  his  account,  to  lay  the  great  emphasis  upon 
the  principles  which  do  indeed  run  through  it,  and 
still  not  go  the  length  of  rejecting  out  and  out  the 
other  elements  which  it  contains,  but,  without  scru- 
tinizing carefully  the  basis  of  their  authority,  accept 
them  as  a  matter  of  fact,  and  then  simply  suffer  them 
to  drop  into  the  background.  This  is  the  attitude 
which  to-day  is  adopted  widely  with  reference  to  the 
Bible  ;  everything  that  is  in  the  Bible  is  claimed  to  be 
divine,  but  the  stress  is  laid  upon  the  general  trend  of 
the  Book,  and  what  is  inconsistent  with  this  general 
trend  is  practically  ignored.  We  have  tried  to  show 
that  not  only  did  Jesus  not  take  the  first  position,  but 
that  in  looking  at  the  Law  as  a  power  for  righteousness 


250       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  ^esiis. 

and  not  as  a  legal  code,  he  recognized  that  this  meant 
in  time  the  falling  away  of  much  that  was  in  the  Law 
itself,  the  rooting  up  of  everything  the  heavenly  Father 
had  not  planted.  There  are,  however,  in  our  Gospels, 
several  sajdngs  which  tend  to  disprove  this  position 
though  some  of  these  are  found  in  passages  which  for 
other  reasons  have  already  been  rejected.  And  of  the 
two  which  remain  one  must  be  given  up  without  hesi- 
tation, the  passage  in  which  Jesus  exhorts  the  people 
to  observ^e  the  tradition  of  the  elders.  Not  only  is  this 
utterly  opposed  to  the  rest  of  Jesus'  teaching,  but  the 
critical  reasons  against  it  are  unusually  strong.  The 
whole  passage  by  which  Matthew  introduces  the  woes 
against  the  Pharisees  seems  to  be  a  literary  combina- 
tion. The  address  changes  in  an  impossible  way  from 
the  people  to  the  disciples,  and  then  to  the  Pharisees. 
The  accusation  against  the  scribes,  that  they  give  no 
help  to  those  whom  they  load  with  burdens,  as  it  seems 
originally  to  have  been,  becomes  an  accusation  that 
they  do  not  bear  these  burdens  themselves,  and  this 
historically  seems  not  to  have  been  true.  Then  Mark's 
parallel  account  is  inserted,  and  five  verses  follow,  two 
of  which  we  still  have  in  their  original  connection  in 
the  source  from  which  both  I^uke  and  Matthew  drew, 
while  the  other  three,  the  prohibition  of  titles,  appar- 
ently are  of  a  later  origin.  It  hardly  was  necessary  to 
warn  Galilean  fishermen  against  accepting  the  title  of 
Rabbi  ;  the  Christ  is  spoken  of  in  a  very  objective  way, 
and  the  position  which  he  is  given  is  the  later  theo- 
logical one  ;  and  the  whole  spirit  of  the  prohibition 
does  not  suggest  Jesus,  who  himself  accepted  the  title 
of  Rabbi  and  teacher  without  demur.  The  discourse 
may  originally  have  opened  with  the  verse  which  gives 
its  motive,  ' '  Ye  shut  the  kingdom  of  heaven  against 


yesus  Attitude  towards  the  Law.        251 

men."  The  other  passage,  however,  of  which  we 
spoke,  and  which  is  found  at  the  beginning  of  the 
Sermon  on  the  Mount,  deserves  a  more  elaborate 
treatment. 

"Think  not,"  says  Jesus,  "that  I  came  to  destroy 
the  lyaw  or  the  prophets  :  I  came  not  to  destroy,  but 
to  ftdfil.  For  verily  I  say  unto  you,  Till  heaven  and 
earth  pass  away,  one  jot  or  one  tittle  shall  in  no  wise 
pass  away  from  the  I^aw,  till  all  things  be  accomplished. 
Whosoever  therefore  shall  break  one  of  these  least  com- 
mandments, and  shall  teach  men  so,  shall  be  called  least 
in  the  kingdom  of  heaven  :  but  whosoever  shall  do  and 
teach  them,  he  shall  be  called  great  in  the  kingdom  of 
heaven."  If  Jesus  really  spoke  these  words,  they  settle 
at  once  his  position  in  regard  to  the  Law,  for  it  does 
not  seem  possible  legitimately  to  get  any  other  meaning 
out  of  them  than  what  appears  on  the  surface.  Critics 
who  have  not  wished  to  admit  this,  have  tried  to  give  a 
different  turn  to  them  :  Professor  Bruce,  for  example,  has 
explained  them  merely  as  a  protest  against  a  hasty  and 
irreverent  setting  aside  of  these  time-honored  require- 
ments, against  the  negative  spirit,  the  spirit  of  icono- 
clasm  ;  and  others  see  in  them  only  a  highly  figurative 
assertion  of  the  perpetuity  of  the  Law  in  its  grand  and 
essential  features.  But,  however  one  may  try  to  per- 
suade himself  of  this,  as  soon  as  he  comes  back  to  the 
words  themselves  he  must  feel  that  his  explanations 
are  not  perfectly  natural  ones.  If  Jesus  had  wished  to 
say  that  the  Law,  in  its  entirety,  was  to  be  perpetually 
valid,  could  he  have  used  any  stronger  words  than 
these,  or  indeed  any  very  different  words  ?  Till  heaven 
and  earth  pass,  not  the  smallest  letter  shall  pass  from 
the  Law  ;  the  very  least  commandment  it  is  forbidden 
to  set  aside.    It  seems  to  us  that  these  words  are  to  be 


252        The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

taken  naturally,  upon  the  face  of  them,  in  their  literal 
sense.  If  an  American  orator,  in  talking  of  the  Con- 
stitution, were  to  say,  Not  a  letter  shall  be  altered  while 
the  country  stands,  and  he  who  disputes  the  smallest 
provision  that  it  contains  is  a  traitor,  we  should  not 
naturally  suppose  him  to  mean  only  that  the  Consti- 
tution was  a  work  of  broad-minded  statesmanship, 
embodying  excellent  political  principles,  but  not  nec- 
essarily adapted  in  its  details  to  the  future,  because  the 
Constitution  carries  to  us,  just  as  the  Law  carried  to 
the  Jew,  the  idea  of  a  definite  document.  Now  sup- 
pose that  when  Jesus  says  neither  jot  nor  tittle  is  to 
pass  away,  he  can  mean  simply  that  the  ethical  stand- 
ard of  the  L,aw  shall  not  be  lowered  a  particle,  can  he 
mean  this  when  he  speaks  of  the  least  commandment  ? 
Commandments  are  commandments,  not  principles ; 
instead  of  looking  at  the  I^aw  as  an  ethical  standard 
and  so  ignoring  its  legal  side,  he  here  uses  the  very 
expression  which  points  to  definite  prescriptions.  The 
word  ' '  least ' '  emphasizes  this  reference.  We  know 
what  Jesus  meant  by  the  lesser  matters  of  the  Law  ; 
what  can  this  least  commandment  mean  but  the  ceremo- 
nial precepts  as  well  ?  And  another  reason  against  this 
interpretation  lies  in  the  fact  that  Jesus'  hearers  could 
not  have  understood  him  to  have  this  meaning,  and 
must  even  have  understood  him  very  differently.  The 
Pharisees  were  accusing  Jesus,  not  in  the  least  of  low- 
ering the  ethical  standard  of  the  Law,  but  of  breaking 
its  ceremonial  requirements.  It  is  true  that  in  their 
minds  the  accent  was  not  upon  the  "  ceremonial,"  but 
upon  the  "  Law,"  for  to  them  the  Law  was  a  whole; 
nevertheless',  it  was  really  to  the  Law  as  ceremonial 
that  their  complaint  had  reference.  If  now  to  this 
state  of  mind  Jesus  had  addressed  such  words  as  these, 


Jesus  Attitude  towards  the  Law.         253 

they  only  could  have  been  understood  in  one  sense, 
that  the  Law,  as  the  Jews  understood  it,  was  to  be  per- 
petually valid.  So  that  Jesus  lays  himself  open  to  the 
charge  intentionally  of  using  words  liable  to  be  mis- 
understood, in  order  to  defend  himself  against  the 
charge  of  his  enemies.  And  even  granting  he  meant 
to  be  understood  in  the  less  obvious  way,  and  that  his 
hearers  so  understood  him,  there  is  the  further  diffi- 
culty that  he  is  begging  the  whole  question,  for  in 
ignoring  the  I,aw  as  a  legal  code,  he  is  ignoring  the 
very  point  which  the  Pharisees  made  against  him. 

For  these  reasons  we  cannot  convince  ourselves  that 
the  words  are  meant  to  be  understood  other  than  in 
their  literal  sense,  so  that  if  Jesus  really  spoke  them, 
he  is  here  expressly  denying  the  position  which  we 
have  attributed  to  him.  But  did  Jesus  really  speak 
these  words  ?  if  he  did  speak  them,  then  they  stand 
alone  among  his  sayings,  they  are  contrary  to  what 
there  are  strong  reasons  for  thinking  was  Jesus'  real 
belief;  and  this  is  enough  to  make  them  very  doubtful. 
And  the  passage  as  an  interpolation  is  easily  explained. 
The  question  of  the  Law  was  a  most  important  one  in 
the  early  Church,  and  some  Jewish  copyist,  meeting 
with  the  words  of  Jesus,  "  I  came  not  to  destroy,  but  to 
fulfil, ' '  may  well  have  thought  he  was  only  carrying 
out  and  expounding  Jesus'  meaning,  in  opposition  to 
the  Paulinists,  by  this  note  which  he  added.  This 
moreover  explains  the  emphasis  which  is  laid  upon 
teaching  that  the  Law  is  abrogated,  a  thing  which 
seems  to  imply  the  actual  controversy  in  the  Church  ; 
whereas  Jesus,  in  a  discourse  relating  wholly  to  per- 
sonal conduct,  would  not  have  been  likely  to  bring  in 
this  allusion  to  a  future  error  of  doctrine.  What,  how- 
ever, is  most  decisive  is  the  fact  that  we  can  still  detect 


254       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 


in  our  passage  a  mixture  of  two  entirely  distinct  points 
of  view.  "Think  not,"  says  Jesus,  "that  I  came 
to  destroy  the  Law  or  the  prophets  :  I  came  not  to 
destroy,  but  to  fulfil. ' '  Now  what  does  this  sentence 
fairly  imply  ?  Does  it  not  imply  that  there  was  some- 
thing in  Jesus'  teaching  w^iich  seemed  to  a  superficial 
view  an  abrogation  of  the  Law  ?  Why  otherwise 
should  it  occur  to  them  to  think  that  he  had  come  to 
destroy  ?  But,  says  Jesus,  this  is  not  so  :  even  when 
I  seem  to  destroy  I  am  really  bringing  out  the  true, 
the  hidden  principle  which  the  Law  strove  to  express 
in  a  partial,  a  tentative  way.  But  in  the  verses 
which  follow,  the  verses  let  us  notice  where  all  the 
critical  difiSculty  occurs,  the  point  of  view  suddenly 
changes,  and  we  have  a  man  to  whom  the  Law  is 
everything,  who  clings  passionately  to  the  smallest 
letter  as  well,  and  will  not  endure  the  least  change  in 
it.  And  with  this  first  point  of  view,  not  with  the 
second,  the  sayings  which  follow  agree.  "I  came 
not,"  says  Jesus,  "to  destro}-,  but  to  fulfil";  and 
then  he  goes  on  to  show  how  this  fulfilment  is  to  be 
brought  about ;  instead  of  a  command  against  mur- 
der, no  angry  feelings,  instead  of  a  command  against 
adultery,  no  lustful  desires,  instead  of  strict  justice, 
mercy,  instead  of  partial  love,  love  which  is  complete. 
If  this  interpretation  is  correct  then,  it  is  a  clear 
statement  of  the  attitude  which  w^e  have  attributed  to 
Jesus.  The  idea  had  alreadj^  got  afloat  that  Jesus  was 
for  breaking  down  the  Law,  and  in  answer  to  this  he 
declares  that  he  has  no  mind  to  destroy  but  to  com- 
plete. But  this  very  statement  implies  that  Jesus 
recognized  the  incompleteness  of  the  Law,  and  in 
showing  how  this  incompleteness  is  to  be  remedied  he 
points  out  in  detail  some  of  the  defects  he  has  in  his 


yesMS  Attitude  towards  the  Law.        255 

thought.  It  would  not  touch  the  general  position  of 
Jesus,  although  that  position  would  not  be  so  dis- 
tinctly stated  in  the  present  passage,  if  these  words 
actually  were  spoken,  as  some  have  thought,  with  the 
practice  of  the  Pharisees  particularly  in  view,  and  not 
the  teaching  of  the  Law.  The  evidence,  however, 
seems  to  us  to  go  against  this  theory.  The  word 
n\i]p&)Gai  might  in  the  connection  have  any  one  of 
three  meanings.  It  might  mean  that  Jesus  had  come 
to  fulfil  the  Law  in  the  sense  that  a  prophecy  might 
be  fulfilled,  by  doing  what  had  been  looked  forward 
to  and  in  a  sense  foretold  when  the  Law  was  given  ; 
or  it  might  mean  that  Jesus  was  to  exhibit  in  his  own 
life  a  perfect  realization  of  the  Law  ;  or  that,  as  we 
have  held,  he  came  to  complete  it,  to  fill  it  with  a 
fuller  meaning.  As  for  the  first  theory,  which  is  a 
popular  one,  that  Jesus  by  his  death  was  to  fulfil  the 
Old  Testament  ritual  and  so  do  away  with  it,  it  only 
need  be  mentioned  in  passing.  Whoever  holds  this 
theory  will  probably  not  be  willing  to  reject  the  follow- 
ing verses,  and  so  it  may  be  pointed  out  that  one  does 
not  talk  about  heaven  and  earth  passing  if  he  only 
means  a  year  or  so  ;  and  besides  it  was  only  after  Jesus* 
death  that  what  he  forbids  could  occur,  the  teaching 
that  some  of  the  Law  was  no  longer  binding.  Between 
the  other  two  meanings  there  are  several  considera- 
tions which  decide  in  favor  of  the  last  one.  In  the 
first  place  ' '  complete  "is  a  better  contrast  to  ' '  de- 
stroy ' '  than  ' '  perform  completely  "  is  :  to  "  destroy 
the  Law"  and  to  "complete  the  Law,"  that  is,  are 
both  to  produce  certain  modifying  and  external  effects 
upon  the  Law  itself  Moreover,  it  is  something  quite 
anomalous  in  Jesus'  teaching,  if  he  lays  the  stress 
upon  his  own  perfect  life,  and  not  upon  the  perfection 


256       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

of  the  truth  which  he  brings  ;  Jesus  elsewhere  never 
transgresses  the  virtue  of  humility  when  his  own  per- 
sonal character  is  concerned.  And  it  also  stands  alone 
in  the  discourse  in  which  it  is  found,  for  through- 
out the  Sermon  Jesus  does  not  again  call  attention  to 
himself ;  whereas  if  the  word  means  ' '  to  complete, ' '  it 
stands  in  an  intimate  connection  with  the  sayings 
which  follow.  Jesus  says  that  he  has  come  to  complete 
the  Law,  and  then  he  goes  on  immediately  to  show 
how  this  completion  is  to  be  brought  about.  The 
obvious  connection  between  these  two  sections,  when 
they  are  interpreted  in  such  a  way,  goes  far  to  show 
that  the  interpretation  is  a  true  one. 

If  therefore  nXijpwaai  is  to  be  translated  "  to  com- 
plete "  the  law,  it  is  almost  certain  that  in  the  succeed- 
ing verses  Jesus  has  the  Law  direct  in  mind,  and  not 
simply  Pharisaic  perversions  of  the  Law.  There  are 
arguments  indeed  for  this  last  alternative.  The  phra- 
seology which  Jesus  uses,  it  is  argued,  ' '  ye  have  heard 
that  it  hath  been  said, ' '  instead  of  "ye  have  read, ' ' 
points  to  the  teaching  prevalent  in  the  synagogue  ;  and 
the  illustrations  which  follow  are  thought  to  show  the 
Pharisaic  temper  in  a  slavish  clinging  to  the  letter,  and 
a  refusal  to  enter  into  the  spirit  of  the  old  command. 
And  particularly  this  would  be  the  case  with  the  in- 
junction, not  simply  to  love  one's  neighbor,  but  to  hate 
one's  enemy  as  well.  But  the  first  argument  is  weak- 
ened by  the  fact  that  while  Jesus  naturally  would  say 
"  ye  have  read,"  in  addressing  Pharisees  and  Rabbis,  he 
just  as  naturally  would  say,  ' '  ye  have  heard, ' '  when  he 
had  to  do  with  uneducated  listeners,  who  had  got  the 
most  of  their  knowledge  by  word  of  mouth .  Moreover, 
' '  I  say  unto  you ' '  is  better  contrasted  with  ' '  it  hath  been 
said ' '  than  with   ' '  ye  have  heard ' '  ;  and  the  very  fact 


yesus   Attitude  towards  the  Law.         257 

that  the  Old  Testament  is  mentioned  at  all  is  enough 
to  show  that  Jesus  had  it  in  his  mind.  If  Jesus  had 
been  thinking  of  the  Pharisees'  teaching  he  would 
probably  have  put  it,  "  ye  have  heard  it  said,"  and  not 
' '  ye  have  heard  that  Moses  said. ' '  And  as  for  the  other 
objection,  we  have  already  indicated  that  we  think  the 
last  clause  is  to  be  thrown  out  ;  and  besides  it  is  in  no 
wise  probable  that  the  Pharisees,  any  more  than  the 
Law  itself,  made  hatred  of  enemies  an  express  theolog- 
ical tenet  in  their  synagogue  teaching.  And  if  this 
clause  is  dropped  all  the  illustrations  are  then  based 
directly  upon  the  Old  Testament,  and  Jesus'  teaching 
is  just  as  truly  an  advance  upon  the  I^aw  as  it  is  upon 
the  Pharisees'  interpretation.  To  be  sure  Jesus  con- 
siders that  he  is  only  carrying  out  principles  which  really 
lie  at  the  basis  of  the  Old  Testament  regulations,  and 
which  any  one,  if  he  had  insight  enough,  might  extract 
from  them,  but  this  does  not  alter  the  fact  that  in 
reality  the  lyaw  had  stopped  half-way,  and  failed  to 
carry  out  the  principles  to  their  true  conclusion. 

To  sum  up,  therefore,  once  again,  Jesus  occupies 
himself  first  and  foremost  with  the  positive  value  of 
the  I,aw  for  righteousness.  He  says  nothing  against 
ritual,  because  in  itself  ritual  may  be  a  good  thing  ; 
he  simply  ignores  it,  and  by  ignoring  it  he  denies  its 
authority.  A  perfect  illustration  of  what  Jesus'  method 
was  we  find  in  a  lesser  question,  the  matter  of  fasting. 
In  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  Jesus  recognizes  fasting 
as  a  legitimate  form  of  religious  exercise,  and  he  as- 
sumes that  his  disciples  will  practise  it.  But  when 
the  Pharisees  are  for  making  it  a  religious  rule,  a  thing 
of  divine  appointment,  Jesus  refuses  to  submit  to  this. 
"  Can  ye  make  the  children  of  the  bride-chamber  fast  so 

long  as  the  bridegroom  is  with  them  ?  But  the  days  will 
17 


258        The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

come  in  which  the  bridegroom  shall  be  taken  from  them, 
and  then  shall  they  fast. ' '  Fasting  may  be  a  good 
thing,  he  has  nothing  to  say  against  it ;  but  it  only  is 
good  when  it  is  a  perfectly  natural  expression  of  reli- 
gious feeling,  and  any  attempt  to  make  it  more  than 
this,  to  make  it  an  obligation,  Jesus  steadily  resists. 


CHAPTER  V. 


JESUS '    DOCTRINE  OP  GOD  AND  MAN. 


THE  religious  conception  of  Jesus,  which  he  em- 
bodied in  his  one  comprehensive  doctrine  of  the 
kingdom  of  heaven,  gathers  itself  about  two  main 
centres,  which  modern  thought  indeed  has  often  tried 
to  show  have  no  essential  connection  with  one  another, 
but  which  in  Jesus'  mind  were  closely  bound  together, 
and  each  of  which  played  a  necessary  part  in  making 
up  the  final  harmony  of  his  view  of  the  world.  These 
two  central  conceptions  were,  on  the  one  side  his  doc- 
trine of  God,  and  on  the  other  side  his  strong  realiza- 
tion of  the  obligation  and  the  beauty  of  righteous 
character,  and  his  sense  of  the  pre-eminent  dignity  and 
value  which  it  lent  to  every  being  who  was  capable 
of  attaining  to  it.  Indeed  it  was  the  very  intensity 
of  these  two  beliefs  which  brought  it  about  that  there 
were  no  more,  which  kept  Jesus'  doctrine  so  admirably 
simple,  and  enabled  him  to  let  go  of  the  swarm  of  half- 
religious  conceptions  which  filled  the  creeds  of  his 
time.  For  the  most  part  it  is  not  men  of  deep  religious 
feeling  whom  we  expect  will  be  the  first  to  see  the 
insufficiency  of  the  prevalent  forms  into  which  religious 
truth  has  become  cast.  The  very  vividness  of  their 
religious  insight  invests  the  forms  as  well  as  the  inner 

259 


26o       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

reality,  unless  these  forms  are  morall}^  unworthy  as 
well,  with  a  sacredness  which  keeps  them  from  seeing 
the  deficiencies.  It  often  happens  that  the  very  defects 
of  a  man's  mind  are  of  use  to  him  in  discovering  the 
negative  aspects  of  truth.  It  is  his  insensibility  to 
what  is  really  of  value  in  an  inadequate  conception 
which  enables  him  to  disentangle  the  knot  which 
holds  the  true  and  the  false  elements  together,  and  to 
see  wherein  the  inadequacy  consists.  It  only  is  in 
supreme  minds  that  the  intensity  and  white  heat  of 
real  and  positive  truth  ser\jes  this  same  purpose,  and 
crumbles  away  everything  that  has  the  least  element 
of  weakness  in  it.  And  it  was  in  this,  rather  than  in 
the  critical  way,  that  Jesus'  mind  acted. 

Jesus'  doctrine  of  God  is  not  a  product  of  philoso- 
phizing, but  the  outcome  of  a  real  personal  need  and  of 
a  direct  insight.  Jesus  never  reasons  about  the  exist- 
ence of  God,  but  he  simply  assumes  it.  It  was  in  an 
atmosphere  of  belief  in  God  that  he  grew  up,  and  there 
was  but  little  in  the  influences  which  were  brought  to 
bear  upon  him  which  could  tend  to  call  up  the  philo- 
sophic doubts  of  modem  times.  Atheism,  if  real 
atheism  there  was  at  all,  in  the  circle  in  which  Jesus 
moved,  was  only  the  wilful  disbelief  of  the  wicked 
man  to  whom  the  thought  of  God  was  distasteful. 
But  the  influence  which  this  belief  has  over  Jesus 
is  not  due  to  the  fact  that  he  had  been  taught  to 
believe  it,  for  he  had  been  taught  to  believe  other 
things  which  he  afterwards  came  to  set  aside  ;  it  is  due 
to  its  meeting  and  satisfying  the  deepest  needs  in 
Jesus'  own  nature.  Accordingly  he  has  not  simply 
taken  up  the  conception  as  it  came  to  him,  but  he  has 
modified  it  ver)''  essentially  in  accordance  with  his  own 
personal  genius.     The  God  of  Jesus  is  both  more  com- 


yesus  Doctrine  of  God  and  Man.       261 

prehensive  and  more  human  than  the  God  of  Judaism. 
The  latter  was  essentially  a  being  throned  outside  the 
world,  whose  direct  relationship  to  men  was  spasmodic 
and  supernatural.  But  to  Jesus  this  was  too  cold  a 
conception.  He  had  too  keen  a  sense  for  the  color  and 
life  of  external  nature,  to  be  willing  that  this  should 
be  shut  off  from  the  all-pervading  influence  of  the 
divine  working.  Accordingly  to  him  the  universe  is 
filled  with  God  ;  God  is  immanent  in  nature,  if  we  may 
give  a  somewhat  modern  tinge  to  the  statement.  He 
clothes  the  lily  and  directs  the  sparrow's  fall,  with 
impartial  beneficence  he  sends  his  rain  on  the  evil  and 
on  the  good.  Whether  Jesus  was  perfectly  consistent 
in  following  this  out  it  is  very  difl&cult  to  say.  Strictly 
it  would  do  away  with  the  Jewish  belief  in  Satan  and 
a  host  of  evil  spirits  who  exert  an  influence  on  earthly 
matters  ;  but  there  is  not  enough  evidence  to  show 
whether  Jesus  went  so  far  as  to  reject  this  view  alto- 
gether. It  is  true  that  the  Gospels  attribute  to  him 
clearly  enough  a  belief  in  Satan  and  in  demons,  but 
the  great  bulk  of  these  passages  are  dubious  in  the 
extreme.  The  passage  in  which  he  defends  himself 
against  the  accusation  of  the  Pharisees,  and  the  parable 
of  the  demoniac,  are  the  only  clear  pieces  of  evidence, 
and  these  do  not  settle  the  question  the  one  way  or  the 
other.  In  the  first  instance  he  confessedly  is  adopting 
the  standpoint  of  his  opponents,  and  in  any  case  his 
habit  of  mind  is  so  picturesque  that  he  naturally 
would  be  led  to  make  use  of  a  popular  belief  which  lent 
itself  so  readily  to  vivid  description.  And  the  parable 
of  the  demoniac  in  particular,  with  its  demons  roaming 
restlessly  about  in  the  dry  places,  and  coming  back  to 
their  home  to  find  it  empty,  swept,  and  garnished, 
impresses  us  as  decidedly  not  being  a  literal  attempt 


262       The  Life  and  TcacJimgs  of  Jesus. 

to  give  Jesus'  ideas  about  devils.  And  if  the  popu- 
lar views  of  the  habits  of  evil  spirits  Jesus  regarded 
merely  as  a  bit  of  poetry  with  which  to  give  color  to  a 
parable,  the  probability  is  that  he  did  not  stop  here. 
Moreover,  it  may  be  noticed  that  Jesus  ordinarily 
places  the  source  of  evil  with  the  man  himself,  in  the 
human  heart.  The  good  man  out  of  the  good  treasure 
brings  forth  good  things,  and  the  evil  man  out  of  the 
evil  treasure  brings  forth  evil  things.  If  in  the  Sermon 
on  the  Mount  Jesus  speaks  of  the  evil  one  as  a  source 
of  evil,  this  also  may  be  only  a  natural  use  of  an  ordi- 
nary conception  ;  and  the  very  fact  that  it  is  decidedly 
uncertain  whether  the  word  is  a  masculine  or  a  neuter 
goes  to  show  that  he  did  not  have  the  thought  of  an 
evil  personality  clearly  fixed  before  his  mind. 

A  much  more  important  modification,  however,  of 
the  common  doctrine  of  God  was  that  which  had  to  do 
with  the  personal  relations  between  God  and  men.  We 
are  become  so  used  to  the  phrase,  the  Fatherhood  of 
God,  that  we  fail  sometimes  to  realize  all  the  meaning 
that  it  carries  with  it.  It  is  the  final  and  definite  re- 
jection of  all  that  is  barbarous  and  arbitrary  in  the  idea 
of  God.  It  means  the  coming  over  to  religion  of  the 
mightily  transforming  power  of  love.  God  is  no  longer 
a  being  to  propitiate,  to  ser\^e  with  fear  and  trembling 
lest  he  be  angry  ;  religion  does  not  consist  in  the  careful 
avoiding  of  a  multitude  of  things  which  a  stern  law- 
giver has  forbidden  ;  but  God  himself  is  the  first  to  ofier 
forgiveness  to  his  erring  children,  and  the  knowledge 
that  it  is  God's  will  that  is  being  done  gives  a  new  joy 
and  incentive  to  action.  Worship  accordingly  ceases 
to  be  the  perfunctory  thing  which  Judaism  had  made 
of  it.  No  longer  something  which  God  commands 
for  his  own  glory,  it  is  the  unforced  outpouring  of  the 


Jesus  Doctrine  of  God  and  Man.       263 

worshipper's  heart  to  one  whose  goodness  he  adores 
and  whose  loving  aid  he  is  sure  of  before  he  asks  for  it. 
Since,  therefore,  God  is  not  a  God  outside  the  world, 
but  constantly  is  working  in  it,  since  all  things  depend 
upon  the  will  of  God  and  carry  out  his  loving  purposes, 
Jesus  could  teach  his  disciples  perfect  trust  in  God 
even  in  the  material  things  of  this  life,  and  could  warn 
them  against  the  anxiety  which  could  see  no  over- 
looking Providence  caring  for  the  affairs  of  men.  It 
certainly  would  be  a  mistake  to  interpret  this  as  if 
Jesus  were  an  impractical  idealist  who  would  have  his 
followers  leave  the  solid  ground  of  reality  and  live  in 
the  visionary  realm  where  the  question  of  bread  and 
butter  no  longer  called  for  any  thought  or  interest. 
This  would  show  an  unwarrantable  neglect  to  make 
allowance  for  the  character  of  Jesus'  style.  In  reality 
it  is  the  same  thought  which  Paul  expresses  in  less 
picturesque  language,  that  all  things  work  together  for 
good  to  them  that  love  God.  Doubtless  even  then  the 
doctrine  is  difficult  for  us  to  hold  with  the  absolute 
confidence  with  which  Jesus  gave  expression  to  it. 
Nevertheless,  if  the  world  is  not  a  bad  world,  if  good- 
ness and  joy  do  in  the  last  analysis  lie  at  the  basis  of 
it,  such  a  belief  is  no  fool's  dream  with  which  to  cheat 
ourselves,  but  a  faith  which  is  well  founded,  even 
though  there  is  much  that  seems  to  go  against  it ;  and 
the  fact  that  we  often  seem  to  ourselves  to  be  losing 
this  faith,  is  only  because  we  do  not  see  so  clearly  as 
Jesus  did  the  divineness  of  the  world.  And  when  this 
unfaith  takes  the  form  of  anxious  worryings,  of  con- 
tinual absorption  in  the  grosser  things  of  life  so  that 
the  higher  powers  of  the  soul  have  no  opportunity  left 
them  for  action,  then  it  becomes  an  unmitigated  evil, 
and  deserves  all  the  warning  that  Jesus  directs  against 


264       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  fesus. 

it.  In  connection  with  this  also  is  to  be  considered 
Jesus'  doctrine  of  prayer.  Jesus  encourages  his  follow- 
ers to  bring  their  needs  to  God,  and  ask  for  his  assist- 
ance, and  the  assurance  that  their  prayers  will  be  heard 
he  bases  upon  the  fact  of  God's  love,  which  always  is 
working  for  the  best  good  of  his  children.  It  would 
seem  from  a  few  passages  that  Jesus  meant  by  this 
what  a  later  and  somewhat  mechanical  interpretation 
has  supposed  him  to  mean,  that  prayer  is  an  instru- 
ment for  forcing  from  God  directly  a  definite,  and,  if 
need  be,  miraculous  answer,  but  this  is  opposed  to  the 
whole  trend  of  Jesus'  teaching,  and  to  his  constant 
exaltation  of  the  will  of  God.  And  there  is  after  all 
no  good  support  for  such  a  view,  for  the  saying  about 
a  sycamore  tree  removed  and  planted  in  the  sea,  when 
it  is  taken  out  of  its  secondary  connection  in  the  story 
of  the  barren  fig-tree,  is  clearly  a  highly  figurative  ex- 
pression ;  and  the  saying  about  the  efficiency  of  prayer 
which  appears  in  the  discourse  about  ofiFences,  has  in  all 
probability  been  treated  very  freely  by  Matthew  and 
Mark  alike,  so  that  we  cannot  reckon  on  its  original 
form.  And  Jesus'  own  pra^-er  which  has  come  down 
to  us  shows  what  form  it  was  he  meant  that  petitions 
for  material  blessings  should  take,  and  how  it  was 
based  upon  the  deeper  conviction  of  the  beneficent 
working  of  God  in  the  material  world. 

The  doctrine  of  God  which  Jesus  held  undoubtedly 
gave  a  deeper  and  more  abiding  sanction  to  his  insist- 
ence on  righteousness.  It  gives  in  the  first  place  the 
assurance  that  efforts  for  righteousness  will  not  prove 
impotent,  and  that  goodness  has  enlisted  on  its  side 
the  power  which  is  supreme,  and  so  is  sure  to  conquer 
in  the  end.  Moreover  it  brings  the  motive  of  loving 
gratitude  into  play  ;  Jesus  could  say,  as  in  effect  he 


Jesus  Doctrine  of  God  and  Man.       265 

did  sa}^  The  love  of  God  which  he  has  shown  to  you, 
and  which  you  owe  to  him,  makes  it  incumbent  on  you, 
if  you  are  not  to  be  self-convicted  of  ingratitude,  to 
work  all  the  harder  to  accomplish  God's  will  for  you. 
But  it  probably  is  neither  on  the  authority  of  God,  nor 
on  the  love  of  God,  though  both  these  motives  go  to 
swell  the  stream,  that  Jesus  rests  ultimately  the  obliga- 
tion of  right-doing.  Here  again  Jesus  does  not  go 
upon  philosophy,  but  on  insight  ;  he  does  not  reason 
that  such  and  such  a  thing  is  right,  but  he  assumes 
that  when  it  is  pointed  out  to  them  all  men  will  recog- 
nize its  obligation.  He  goes  on  authority,  as  the  Jews 
did,  but  it  is  on  the  authority  of  the  moral  insight 
rather  than  on  the  authority  of  external  commands. 
And  the  supreme  value  of  his  teaching  about  righteous- 
ness lies  in  the  marvellous  lucidity  of  his  vision,  and 
the  unerring  touch  with  which  he  settles  upon  just  the 
principles  which  continued  experience  and  modern 
scrutiny  tend  to  establish  most  firmly  and  securely. 

One  of  the  most  noticeable  features  which  this  intro- 
duced into  Jesus'  teaching  was  the  supreme  importance 
and  value  which  he  attached  to  the  individual.  This 
was  due,  in  part,  to  his  keen  sympathies  with  the  sor- 
rows and  misery  of  men,  and  to  the  clearing  away  of 
all  artificial  distinctions  and  harsh,  unloving  judg- 
ments which  his  perception  of  the  love  of  God  would 
necessarily  bring  about.  When  Jesus  came  with  the 
announcement,  Blessed  are  the  poor,  blessed  are  the 
sorrowful,  when  he  turned  to  the  publicans  and  harlots, 
he  struck,  in  a  very  large  measure,  a  new  note  in  reli- 
gion. The  old  religion  of  Israel  had  been  a  religion  for 
the  nation  ;  Jesus'  religion  was  a  religion  for  the  man, 
and  not  for  the  wise  man  alone,  nor  for  the  strong  man. 
Blessed  are  the  poor,  blessed  are  they  that  mourn  ;  not 


266       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

because  they  are  poor,  but  because  poverty  is  no  longer 
to  debar  them  from  their  manhood  ;  not  because  they 
mourn,  but  because  comfort  is  within  their  reach.  And 
his  perception  that  righteousness  is  not  something 
to  be  brought  about  in  the  lump,  but  that  each  man 
must  win  it  for  himself  in  his  owm  character,  went  also 
to  make  him  turn  his  efforts,  first  of  all,  to  the  indi- 
vidual. He  made  no  attempt  to  found  an  organization 
in  the  strict  sense  of  the  word.  It  was  in  the  disciples' 
hands  that  the  keys  of  the  kingdom  were  placed,  to 
bind  or  loose,  as  the  Spirit  should  direct  them.  Into 
questions  of  politics  he  declined  to  enter  :  ' '  Render 
unto  Caesar  the  things  that  are  Caesar's,  and  to  God 
the  things  that  are  God's,"  was  his  answer  to  the 
eternal  problem  of  his  contemporaries  as  to  what  rela- 
tion the  people  of  God  should  bear  towards  the  Roman 
power.  And  in  this  reserve  of  Jesus,  in  this  devotion 
to  a  single  end,  there  lay  one  great  secret  of  his  success. 
Jesus  sometimes  has  been  blamed  because  he  did  not 
throw  himself  more  into  the  social  and  political  ques- 
tions of  the  day,  because  he  did  not  leave  us  his  views 
upon  philanthropy  and  government  and  the  manifold 
questions,  important  no  doubt,  which  call  for  a  solution 
from  society.  But  such  a  criticism  is  short-sighted. 
If  Jesus  had  done  this  he  might  have  been  a  great 
reformer,  but  he  never  could  have  been  the  teacher  and 
the  saviour  of  the  world ;  if  he  had  worked  directly  for 
institutions  and  for  social  organizations,  he  must  have 
accommodated  himself  to  the  conditions  by  which  he 
was  surrounded,  and  have  given  up  all  thought  of 
universal  truth.  For  institutions  cannot  well  be  estab- 
lished on  such  a  basis,  they  must  be  content,  not  with 
the  best,  but  with  the  best  that  can  be  had  ;  and  most 
of  all  this  would  have  been  so  in  Jesus'  day.     So  that, 


Jesus  Doctrine  of  God  and  Man.       267 

do  the  best  he  could,  he  must  still  have  left  the  future 
to  solve  its  own  problems.  But  while  social  questions 
are  relative,  the  principles  which  are  to  control  the 
individual  in  all  relations,  the  motives  which  are  to 
govern  his  conduct,  are,  in  large  measure,  absolute  and 
universal ;  and  it  is  upon  these,  after  all,  that  social 
questions  rest.  It  is  only  when  the  man  is  transformed, 
as  Jesus  tried  to  transform  him,  that  the  solution  of 
social  questions  first  becomes  possible. 

What  the  ideal  was  which  Jesus  set  as  the  goal  of 
human  attainment,  one  cannot  get  more  clearly  before 
him  than  by  reading  the  words  of  Jesus  himself  as  they 
are  recorded  in  the  Gospels.  No  paraphrase  of  them 
can  convey  half  so  vivid  an  impression.  Nevertheless, 
without  trying  to  make  a  complete  statement  of  it,  a 
few  of  the  more  prominent  points  may  here  be  noticed. 
In  the  first  place,  as  has  been  mentioned  already,  Jesus 
places  the  sphere  of  a  man's  religious  activity  first  and 
foremost  in  the  ordinary  and  every-day  relations  of  the 
present  life.  It  is  true  that  he  puts  love  to  God  before 
love  to  man,  because,  in  his  view  of  it,  love  to  God  is 
the  more  comprehensive  of  the  two  and  implies  the 
other  at  the  same  time  that  it  insures  its  completeness 
and  permanence.  But  religion  ordinarily  goes  beyond 
this,  and  puts  an  equally  high  value  upon  the  more 
purely  formal  phases  of  the  relationship  between  God 
and  man.  The  forms  of  worship  accordingly,  the 
observance  of  a  certain  number  of  acts  by  which  cus- 
tom has  settled  it  that  the  existence  of  a  Divine  Being 
shall  be  recognized,  whatever  in  fact  has  come  to  be 
closely  associated  with  the  bare  name  of  God,  is  looked 
upon  as  in  a  special  degree  the  property  of  religion, 
and  the  tendency  is  that  it  should  be  regarded  as  exclu- 
sively so.     Nowadays,  for  instance,  there  are  many  to 


268       TJie  Life  ajid  Teachings  of  yestcs. 

whom  it  seems  that  keeping  a  specified  time  holy  to 
God,  attending  a  prayer-meeting,  bearing  testimony  in 
a  religious  gathering,  are  religious  acts  par  exccUmce  ; 
so  that  a  man  even  may  be  a  thoroughly  religious  man, 
whose  life  is  wholly  selfish,  or  upon  whose  word  his 
neighbors  cannot  rely.  Not  only  does  this  have  a  bad 
effect  in  deadening  and  formalizing  those  acts  upon 
which  the  stress  is  laid,  but  what  is  much  worse,  it 
confines  religion  to  a  very  restricted  and  inadequate 
field,  and  makes  it  indifferent,  or  ev^en  antagonistic,  to 
what  to  the  majority  of  men  must  always  be  the  larger 
and  the  more  interesting  part  of  life.  Jesus  is  far  from 
making  any  such  a  limitation.  The  sphere  of  religion 
is  co-extensive  with  the  sphere  of  human  conduct. 
Religionism,  as  opposed  to  righteousness,  Jesus  merci- 
lessl3'  condemns  in  its  typical  representatives,  the 
Pharisees.  Nothing  Godward  is  of  the  least  avail  if 
it  is  not  backed  and  fortified  by  the  practical  religion 
of  neighborly  love.  The  gift  is  to  be  left  unhesitat- 
ingly upon  the  altar  till  the  reconcilement  is  brought 
about,  for  not  till  then  will  the  worship  be  accepted. 

Closely  akin  to  this,  there  is  the  avoidance  in  Jesus' 
ideal  of  the  fault  which  is  distinctively  a  religious 
fault,  and  which  to  a  deeply  religious  mind  has  a 
peculiar  charm,  the  tendency  to  asceticism.  It  is  true 
that  there  are  a  few  passages  which  have  been  thought 
to  show  just  this  tendency  in  Jesus,  but  there  is  the 
whole  spirit  of  his  sa5dngs  to  set  over  against  these. 
Nothing  is  more  evident  from  Jesus'  words  taken  as  a 
whole  than  the  genialness  of  the  man,  his  ready 
sympathy  with  all  the  varied  forms  of  popular  life,  his 
quick  eye  for  nature  and  his  keen  delight  in  natural 
beauty.  Moreover,  so  far  was  he  from  adopting  in  his 
own    mode    of   life    the    ascetic    habit,    and    such  a 


yesus  Doctrine  of  God  and  Man.       269 

contrast  was  he  to  the  austere  and  gloomj^  John,  that 
it  oflfered  a  handle  to  the  Pharisees  for  their  taunt  of 
glutton  and  winebibber.  This  is  really  decisiv^e  as  to 
the  tone  which  characterized  Jesus,  and  there  is  nothing 
that  can  be  brought  up  on  the  other  side  that  is  suffi- 
cient to  make  one  come  to  any  different  conclusion. 
To  be  sure  Jesus  does  recognize  the  disparity  in  the 
value  of  things,  that  what  is  good  may  not  be  what  is 
best,  and  he  insists  upon  the  supreme  obligation  of 
what  is  highest  and  noblest.  Jesus  recognizes  too  that 
even  good  things  ma}^  by  force  of  circumstance  become 
an  evil,  and  then,  he  says,  get  rid  of  them  at  whatever 
cost.  ' '  If  thy  hand  or  thy  foot  cause  thee  to  stumble, 
cut  them  off  and  cast  them  from  thee."  But  this  is 
far  from  saying  that  a  hand  is  not  in  itself  a  pre-em- 
inently desirable  thing,  or  that  its  loss  does  not  leave 
one  maimed  and  imperfect.  In  the  matter  of  wealth, 
to  take  the  example  which  is  most  often  brought  up 
against  Jesus,  he  declares,  what  is  a  simple  matter  of 
fact,  that  it  is  hard  for  the  rich  man  to  enter  into  the 
kingdom  of  heaven,  that  the  eager  pursuit  of  wealth, 
and  the  lassitude  which  comes  with  the  possession  of 
wealth,  do  not  naturally,  in  the  case  of  the  average 
man,  make  for  a  temper  of  mind  to  which  devotion  to 
the  higher  interests  and  capacities,  to  the  things  of  the 
kingdom  of  heaven,  as  Jesus  puts  it,  is  of  supreme 
importance.  But  while  Jesus  requires  everything  to  be 
made  tributary  to  the  service  of  God,  to  be  held  in 
readiness,  that  is,  to  be  used  as  love  to  God  and  love  to 
man,  and  not  selfish  interest,  may  demand,  there  is 
nothing  to  show  that  he  thought  of  imposing  any  hard 
and  fast  program  on  his  followers,  according  to  which 
they  were  literally  to  give  up  what  they  possessed. 
The  sayings  which  seem  to  imply  this  are  most  of 


270       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

them  due  to  Luke,  who   doubtless  himself  had  some 
such  notion. 

Still  less  is  there  any  reason  to  suppose  that  Jesus 
saw  anything  unworthy  in  the  marriage  relation  ;  on 
the  contrary  he  gives  to  it  all  the  sacredness  which 
comes  from  a  divine  sanction.  It  probably  is  of  him- 
self that  he  is  thinking  when  he  speaks  to  his  disciples 
of  those  who  have  made  themselves  eunuchs  for  the 
kingdom  of  heaven's  sake.  It  was  because  his  work 
was  to  him  before  all  things  sacred,  and  because  noth- 
ing else  had  the  right  to  interfere  with  this,  that  he 
himself  had  never  married.  But  he  expressly  states 
this,  not  as  a  general  rule,  but  as  something  which 
exceptional  circumstances,  which  each  one  must  judge 
of  for  himself;  may  make  best  for  a  man  ;  and  one 
may  even  catch  a  note  of  wistful  sadness  in  the  sajdng, 
as  if  Jesus  knew  in  himself  that  a  ' '  eunuch  for  the 
kingdom  of  heaven's  sake  "  was  something  to  which 
one's  natural  inclinations  did  not  lead,  but  which  one 
must  ' '  make  himself, ' '  an  attainment  not  naturally  or 
easily  come  by.  The  only  passage  which  really  seems 
to  show  a  different  temper  is  the  saying  to  a  would-be 
follower,  when  he  asked  permission  first  to  go  and 
bury  his  father.  This  on  the  surface  does  not  show 
the  mild  and  sympathetic  spirit  of  Jesus,  and  if  the 
circumstances  were  no  more  nor  less  than  those  which 
are  reported,  the  harshness  of  Jesus  is  scarcely  to  be 
defended.  Nevertheless  it  is  not  difiicult  to  suppose 
that  if  we  knew  just  the  facts  of  the  case  the  words  of 
Jesus  would  have  a  different  complexion,  and  some 
such  modifying  circumstances  perhaps  we  may  conjec- 
ture, so  as  to  bring  the  passage  into  harmony  with  the 
rest  of  Jesus'  sayings.  The  similar  incident  with 
which  lyuke  follows  this  is  still  more  foreign  to  Jesus' 


yesus  Doctrine  of  God  and  Man.       2  7 1 

character,  and  Ivuke's  authority  is  not  enough  to  create 
any  presumption  in  favor  of  its  genuineness. 

Joyfulness  is  therefore  a  conspicuous  thing  in  the 
character  of  him  who  has  been  instructed  into  the 
kingdom  of  heaven.  Jesus'  reHgion  is  something  de- 
cidedly cheerful  and  hopeful.  Blessedness  is  the  key- 
note to  it,  the  children  of  the  bride-chamber  perforce 
must  rejoice,  it  is  like  to  hid  treasure  for  the  eager  de- 
light of  possession.  Of  late,  it  has  been  rather  the 
fashion  to  be  suspicious  of  happiness  as  a  motive,  and 
only  to  find  those  actions  deserving  of  respect  which 
have  no  taint  of  recompense  in  any  way  attached  to 
them,  but  which  are  based  solely  on  a  stem  and  stoical 
sense  of  duty.  And  it  is  true,  of  course,  that  when 
our  happiness  is  the  end  we  have  direct  in  view,  it  is 
only  selfishness  we  are  acting  out,  however  it  may  be 
disguised.  Nevertheless  the  paradox  always  remains 
that  happiness  must  have  its  part  in  a  completed  ideal 
of  humanity,  and  that,  without  usurping  the  place  of 
supreme  importance,  its  influence  must  nevertheless 
be  felt  indirectly  throughout  the  whole  range  of  human 
activity,  by  giving  a  tinge  of  hopefulness,  and  by 
guarding  against  any  gloomy  and  despairing  view  of 
life,  such  as  it  is  inevitable  will  weaken  the  springs  of 
action  in  the  larger  part  of  mankind.  Popular  religion 
is  apt  to  err  in  the  direction  of  a  more  or  less  thinly 
disguised  selfishness,  by  the  emphasis  which  it  lays 
upon  the  idea  of  reward  in  another  life.  Jesus  guards 
against  both  faults,  at  once  by  the  balance  which  he 
maintains  between  the  two  motives  of  a  desire  for  hap- 
piness and  a  naked  sense  of  duty,  and  partly  also  by 
the  nature  of  the  happiness  which  he  promises.  It  is 
not  often,  when  Jesus  is  urging  some  definite  duty 
upon  men,  that  we  find  him  making  much  appeal  to 


272        The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

the  desire  for  happiness  ;  he  prefers  that  they  should 
make  their  fight  and  gain  their  victory  as  much  as  pos- 
sible on  the  lines  of  simple  right  and  wrong.  And  on 
the  other  hand  he  does  not  tell  his  disciples  that  the 
desire  to  be  happ}'  is  something  selfish  and  culpable, 
but  he  dwells  just  enough  upon  this  desire,  and  the 
certainty  of  its  accomplishment,  to  keep  men  from  de- 
spondency, and  to  fill  them  with  a  general  cheeriness 
and  healthfulness  of  moral  tone  which  shall  stand  them 
in  the  time  of  actual  struggle.  And  besides  this  the 
joy  which  Jesus  promises  is  less  frequently  the  some- 
what external  and  arbitrary  reward  which  makes  the 
most  appeal  to  self-seeking,  than  the  more  delicate  and 
quiet  joy  which  lies  wrapped  up  in  right-doing  itself, 
the  joy  of  generosity,  of  self-sacrifice,  of  helpfulness 
towards  men  and  peace  with  God.  For  in  its  practical 
working  such  a  reward  is  no  subtle  bait  to  entice  men 
to  goodness,  but  onlj^  after  the  spirit  of  sacrifice  has 
been  won  by  a  joyless  struggle  does  the  joy  which  it 
brings  become  a  real  and  living  motive,  capable  of 
influencing  to  action. 

Another  characteristic  of  the  ideal  of  life  which 
Jesus  sets  up  is  the  way  in  which  he  goes  to  the  bot- 
tom of  things,  and  devotes  his  attention  to  the  inner 
springs  of  action  rather  than  to  outward  conduct 
alone.  When  it  is  said  that  Jesus'  teaching  had  chiefly 
to  do  with  morality,  the  assertion  is  apt  to  meet  with 
disapproval  in  certain  circles  at  the  present  day,  in  con- 
sequence of  the  fact  that  the  word  morality,  in  its  re- 
ligious use,  has  come  to  have  a  somewhat  anomalous 
meaning.  The  moral  man,  in  religious  language,  is 
the  man  just  with  a  veneer  of  decency,  which  prevents 
him  from  getting  into  the  penitentiarj^,  but  which  does 
not  come  from  the  fulness  of  life  and  character  within. 


yesus  Doctrine  of  God  and  Man.        273 

It  is  this  too  external  conception  of  what  righteousness 
is,  which  has  done  much  in  keeping  up  the  intermina- 
ble discussions  as  to  the  relative  value  of  faith  and 
works  in  a  man's  salvation,  and  which  has  been  the 
truth  at  the  bottom  of  the  constant  contention  of  reli- 
gious teachers,  that  morality  alone  will  not  save  a  man. 
Now  Jesus  does  away  at  once  with  the  whole  ground 
of  dispute  by  basing  salvation  not  upon  conduct,  but 
upon  character.  When  a  man  gets  so  that  he  not  only 
does  right  but  loves  right,  when  he  not  merely  keeps 
from  committing  murder  but  has  no  disposition  to  be 
angry  with  his  neighbor,  when  he  no  longer  simply 
keeps  his  lust  from  mastering  him  in  outward  acts  but 
is  absolutely  pure  in  heart,  there  is  no  higher  salvation 
than  this,  the  growth  of  a  man  into  the  divine  char- 
acter. And  this  is  the  goal  which  Jesus  constantly 
has  in  view,  and  than  which  he  is  satisfied  with  noth- 
ing less. 

The  principle  which  lies  at  the  bottom  of  the  de- 
mands which  Jesus  makes  of  the  citizen  of  the  new 
kingdom  may  be  summed  up  in  the  one  word,  unselfish- 
ness. No  longer  is  each  man  to  make  of  his  own  petty 
self  the  centre  of  the  universe,  and  toil  and  plan  for  his 
own  individual  interests  first  of  all ;  he  must  recognize 
that  beside  him  stands  his  brother,  whose  welfare  and 
interests  have  just  as  great  a  value  as  his  own,  and 
that  his  true  life  consists,  not  in  living  to  himself  alone, 
but  in  the  larger  and  freer  life  of  the  whole,  where  in- 
dividual interests  are  seen  with  the  truer  vision  of 
universal  love.  ^  Without  trying  to  follow  Jesus  out  in 
all  the  applications  which  he  makes  of  this  principle, 
we  may  close  with  a  brief  examination  of  the  doctrine 
which  illustrates  it  in  the  most  thorough- going  way, 

and  which  is  altogether  one  of  the  most  original  ele- 
18 


2  74        The  Life  and  Teachmgs  of  fesus. 

ments  in  Jesus'  ethical  teaching,  his  doctrine  of  retalia- 
tion. Jesus'  expression  of  this  doctrine  has  sometimes 
been  found  to  furnish  difficulty,  chiefly  because  enough 
attention  has  not  been  paid  to  his  ordinary  manner  of 
teaching.  What  does  Jesus  mean  ?  When  one  injures 
us,  are  we  actually  to  invite  him  to  repeat  the  injury  ? 
Are  wrongs  absolutely  to  go  unpunished.  Is  universal 
and  unquestioning  giving  what  Jesus  would  have  ?  At 
once  we  feel  the  difficulty  of  this,  and  we  see  how  dan- 
gerous it  might  become  if  it  were  faithfully  carried  out. 
But  it  is  evident  that  this  is  not  what  Jesus  meant,  evi- 
dent from  the  very  sermon  of  which  the  passage  on 
retaliation  is  a  part.  It  is  the  foundation  of  Jesus' 
teaching  that  he  insists  on  principles  rather  than  on 
particular  applications.  He  does  not  say  to  men, 
Under  these  circumstances  do  so  and  so  ;  under  those 
circumstances  act  in  the  opposite  way  ;  but  he  shows 
the  motive  which  is  to  guide  them,  whatever  the  cir- 
cumstances may  happen  to  be,  because  he  recognizes 
that  no  man  can  possibly  prescribe  to  his  neighbor  just 
what  his  actions  ought  to  be,  but  at  best  can  only  giv^e 
him  the  clue  which  will  enable  him  to  decide  for  him- 
self. So  in  this  sermon  it  is  Jesus'  special  aim  to  get 
back  of  the  particular  requirements  of  the  old  law  to 
the  underlying  principles,  and  this  very  purpose  he 
would  have  defeated  if  he  had  only  substituted  other 
special  requirements  instead.  Only,  instead  of  putting 
these  principles  in  an  abstract  form,  he  chooses  some 
concrete  example  to  illustrate  them  in  a  striking  and 
even  at  times  exaggerated  way,  that  they  may  strike 
home  upon  the  imaginations  of  his  hearers.  But  he  no 
more  means  that  of  necessity  we  are  to  turn  the  other 
cheek  to  the  one  who  strikes  us,  than  that  we  are 
actually  to  pluck  out  the  eye  or  sever  the  limb  which 


yesus  Doctrine  of  God  and  Man.        275 


causes    us  to  stumble.      What  then,  is  the  principle 
which  by  these  examples  he  is  trying  to  express  ? 

We  have  seen  the  thing  that  Jesus  does  not  mean  : 
he  does  not  mean  that  wrong-doing  shall  go  on  quite 
without  restraint  and  check.  He  does  not  say  that 
society  shall  not  protect  itself,  and  make  it  difficult  and 
dangerous  for  wrongs  to  be  committed  ;  indeed,  he 
probably  is  not  thinking  of  society  at  all.  And  so,  in 
the  same  way,  if  in  any  case  by  punishing  an  act  of 
personal  wrong  done  to  himself,  a  man  should  so  be 
able  to  protect  himself  and  society  in  the  future,  to  this 
also  Jesus'  words  would  not  apply.  We  shall  begin 
to  see  what  Jesus  has  in  mind  if  we  recognize  the  pur- 
pose that  belongs  to  punishment.  For  there  are  two 
very  diflferent  ways  in  which  one  may  look  at  punish- 
ment ;  there  is  punishment  which  has  some  greater 
good  in  view  behind  it,  and  there  is  punishment  just 
for  punishment's  sake.  It  may  be  that  by  punishing 
a  wrong,  a  man  can  bring  about  his  neighbor's  good, 
that  he  can  deter  the  wrongdoer  from  going  farther 
in  the  way  which,  after  all,  will  bring  most  harm  to 
himself;  and  then,  of  course,  punishment  would  be 
the  very  best  proof  of  love  that  he  could  give.  But 
punishment  that  is  not  based  upon  love,  retaliation, 
a  mere  penalty,  so  much  suffering  received  for  so 
much  given,  this  is  what  Jesus  forbids ;  the  spirit  of 
love  that  seeks  one's  neighbor's  best  good,  is  the  prin- 
ciple he  lays  down  in  its  stead.  No  doubt  the  doc- 
trine seems  a  very  hard  one  ;  indeed,  there  are  few 
things  which  the  ordinary  man  is  less  ready  to  accept. 
What,  we  say,  are  we  not  to  have  our  rights?  are  we 
to  suffer  injuries  without  resenting  them  ?  are  we  not 
to  get  justice  for  ourselves?  No,  says  Jesus,  how- 
ever natural  your  feeling  may  be,  so  long  as  you  stand 


276        The  Life  and  Teachings  of  yesMS. 

upon  your  rights  you  are  not  a  follower  of  mine.  For 
in  so  doing  you  still  are  making  yourself  the  centre, 
whereas  I  command  )ou  to  give  up  your  own  indi- 
vidual life  for  the  principle  of  love  that  shall  take  in 
your  neighbor  as  well.  It  is  this  very  feeling  which 
seems  so  natural  to  3^ou  against  which,  first  of  all,  my 
principle  is  directed.  Not  that  the  feeling  of  indigna- 
tion and  of  protest  is  wholly  wrong.  We  feel  that  we 
are  right  to  be  indignant  at  injustice  and  oppression  ; 
we  burn  at  wrongs  done  to  the  helpless.  But  however 
well  this  may  be  in  the  abstract,  we  know  that  as  a 
matter  of  fact,  and  particularly  where  it  is  ourselves 
that  are  wronged,  there  usually  is  something  quite 
different  that  comes  in.  It  is  not  pure  indignation  at 
injustice  which  prompts  a  man  to  pay  his  enemy  back, 
it  is  his  wrong,  it  is  anger  that  he  should  be  de- 
frauded and  his  rights  disregarded,  it  is  resentment 
that  is  personal  and  vindictive ;  and  this  resentment 
Jesus'  principle  forbids  just  as  truly  as  it  forbids  an 
outward  act  of  retaliation,  because  resentment  just  as 
truly  as  retaliation  is  contrary  to  love.  Many  a  man 
has  said  to  himself,  I  will  not  pay  my  enemy  back,  as 
he  deserves,  though  I  should  very  much  like  to  do  it, 
if  it  were  not  forbidden  ;  but  I  wash  my  hands  of  him 
from  this  time  forth,  and  he  need  expect  no  more 
favors  from  me.  But  how  much  better  is  he,  measured 
by  Jesus'  principle,  than  his  neighbor  w^ho  pays  his 
debts  by  knocking  his  enemy  down  ?  What  that  prin- 
ciple forbids  is  not  only  the  expression  of  resentment, 
but  resentment  itself,  even  more  truly  ;  what  it  enjoins 
is  the  spirit  of  love  which  lays  up  no  grudge  for  inju- 
ries, which  always  is  ready  with  help  and  with  for- 
giveness. 

And  so  we  have  the  culminating  stage  of  Jesus'  doc- 


yesus  Doctrine  of  God  and  Man.        277 

trine  of  human  character.  It  is  not  so  very  difficult  to 
be  honest  in  business,  to  treat  our  neighbors  fairly  and 
justly,  to  abstain  from  cheating  them  when  we  have 
the  chance,  to  live  purely  and  honorably.  It  is  easy 
to  love  those  who  love  us,  to  bear  kindly  feelings 
and  give  generous  help  to  those  who  are  courteous  and 
honorable  in  their  dealings,  pleasant  neighbors  and 
good  friends.  But  to  love  our  enemies,  to  bless  them 
that  curse  us,  to  look  on  and  see  what  we  take  to  be 
our  rights  trampled  upon,  and  resist  the  desire  to 
make  the  offender  smart  for  his  deeds,  to  do  this  with- 
out a  particle  of  resentment  and  ill-feeling,  and  to  be 
ready,  however  often  we  may  be  ill-treated  and  our 
good  offices  spurned,  to  offer  our  help  again  when  the 
help  is  needed,  how  very  hard  it  seems  to  us  ;  how 
often  we  are  tempted  to  say  such  virtue  is  out  of  hu- 
man reach.  And  yet  this  is  the  ideal  which  Jesus  sets  ; 
and  he  sets  it,  not  as  an  ideal  which  is  beautiful  and 
admirable,  but  which  a  man,  if  he  finds  it  a  little  too 
hard,  may  set  aside  and  be  content  with  something 
just  a  little  easier,  but  as  the  necessary  goal  of  every 
man's  attainment.  For  Jesus  nothing  less  than  per- 
fection will  suffice.  ' '  Ye  therefore  shall  be  perfect, 
even  as  your  Father  which  is  in  heaven  is  perfect." 


CHAPTER  VI. 


THB  FUTURE  OP  THE  KINGDOM. 


IT  is  one  of  the  diflScult  things  about  Jesus'  teaching, 
perhaps  on  the  whole  the  most  difficult  question  of 
all,  precisely  what  it  was  that  Jesus  believed  about 
the  future  of  the  kingdom  which  he  had  come  to  found. 
It  is  not  the  case  here,  as  it  is  in  other  aspects  of  his 
teaching,  that  on  one  side  is  a  belief  which  we  can 
determine  with  practical  certainty  that  Jesus  held,  and 
on  the  other  side  a  few  passages  which  conflict  with 
this  ;  at  any  rate  the  conflicting  passages  are  much 
more  evenly  divided,  and  there  is  considerably  more 
reason  to  hesitate  before  settling  upon  which  set  of  them 
is  to  be  preferred.  It  is  not  strange  that  this  should  be 
so,  for  it  is  about  the  future  that  the  religious  fancy 
most  inveterately  plays,  and  for  the  early  generations 
of  the  Christians  in  particular  the  apocalyptic  elements, 
brought  over  from  Judaism  into  Christianity,  possessed 
a  peculiarly  intense  interest,  which  could  not  fail  to 
influence  materially  the  tradition  of  Jesus'  words.  It 
will  be  well  therefore  to  begin  somewhat  cautiously 
with  those  passages  which  are  best  assured. 

According  to  our  Gospels,  which  here  seem  to  be 
following  Mark,  Jesus  began  immediately  after  Peter's 
confession  at  Csesarea  Philippi  to  warn  his  disciples  of 

278 


The  Ftiture  of  the  Kingdom.  279 

his  approaching  death  ;  and  in  connection  with  this 
there  is  an  incident  in  which  he  rebukes  Peter,  because 
Peter  will  not  recognize  such  a  possibilit3^  This 
narrative,  it  is  true,  can  scarcely  be  depended  on. 
Mark's  authority  is  never  of  the  best,  and  the  fact  that 
here,  as  usual,  he  constructs  his  picture  out  of  material 
which  he  gets  piecemeal  from  his  source,  and  puts  in 
Jesus'  mouth  words  which  tradition  already  had  told 
of  more  appropriately  in  the  answer  to  the  devil  in  the 
wilderness,  is  still  further  against  him.  Nevertheless 
all  that  it  is  important  for  us  to  establish,  the  fact  that 
Jesus  looked  forward  to  his  own  death,  is  contained  in 
the  words  by  which,  just  before,  Jesus  commends 
Peter.  The  Church  which  Jesus  himself  had  not  been 
able  to  found  shall  still  be  founded,  now  that  the  dis- 
ciples have  recognized  the  central  thought  of  his 
teaching  ;  theirs  is  the  task  of  realizing  it  as  an  actual 
community,  of  determining  what  its  external  form  and 
polity  shall  be.  Here  certainly  Jesus  looks  to  the  ex- 
tension of  his  kingdom  ;  and  because  to  the  disciples 
and  not  to  himself  is  left  the  authority,  it  is  an  exten- 
sion which  is  to  take  place  after  he  is  dead.  And  there 
is  no  difficulty  in  this.  If  Jesus'  idea  of  the  Messiah- 
ship  was  wholly  spiritual,  and  not  material  at  all,  there 
was  nothing  to  make  his  own  death  impossible  for  him 
to  think  of,  while  an  insight  much  less  keen  than  his 
own  must  have  shown  him  that  from  the  Pharisees  he 
stood  in  serious  danger.  No  doubt  the  Evangelists 
have  made  his  predictions  much  more  definite  than 
they  really  were,  and  indeed  we  have  no  direct  predic- 
tion of  death  which  is  worth  a  great  deal.  The  only 
case  for  which  much  can  be  said,  barring  a  few  re- 
corded just  before  his  betrayal  which  will  be  examined 
in  another  place,  is  the   parable  of  the  bridegroom, 


28o       The  Life  a7id  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

and  probably  from  the  parable  of  the  bridegroom  we 
are  not  safe  in  drawing  any  but  the  most  general  con- 
clusion. The  parable  is  not  meant  definitely  as  an 
allegory  of  Jesus  and  his  disciples  ;  what  Jesus  means 
to  say  is  that  expression  of  sorrow  will  come  with  the 
time  of  sorrow,  and  he  illustrates  this  by  an  example 
taken  from  everj'-day  life,  although  it  may  be  indeed 
that  he  is  casting  a  side-glance  at  himself.  There  is, 
however,  suflScient  evidence  that  Jesus  prepared  his 
disciples  for  a  ministry  in  which  his  own  previous 
death  was  clearly  implied.  Even  here,  it  is  true,  we 
cannot  rely  upon  every  passage.  The  passage  in 
Matthew,  for  instance,  upon  Church  discipline,  is 
shown  both  on  critical  grounds  and  by  internal  evi- 
dence to  be  of  later  origin ;  and  the  last  Beatitude, 
which  speaks  of  persecutions  which  the  disciples  are 
to  endure — evidently  with  the  supposition  that  Jesus 
no  longer  is  with  them, — in  all  probability  is  an  inter- 
polation. Jesus  has  been  speaking  of  the  blessings 
which  are  to  come  into  the  lives  of  the  needy  through 
the  knowledge  of  the  kingdom,  of  the  void  which  the 
kingdom  is  to  fill ;  and  now  it  is  an  entirely  forced 
transition  to  pass  over  at  once  to  the  rewards  for  cer- 
tain unpleasant  things  which  only  are  to  come  some- 
time in  the  future.  The  only  bond  between  the  two  is 
that  they  both  refer  to  phj^sical  sufferings.  But  with- 
out leaning  upon  these  passages,  the  words  to  Peter 
are  enough  to  prove  the  point,  and  to  this  may  be 
added  in  particular  the  discourse  upon  confidence  in 
God."  Here  Jesus  assumes  that  the  teaching  which 
he  has  given  to  them  in  secret  is  after  his  death  to  be 
proclaimed  openly,  and  that  their  work  will  not  be  free 
from  dangers  which  will  tempt  them  to  deny  him ;  in 

'  I^uke  12 :  xff. 


The  Future  of  the  Kingdom.  281 

its  main  features  the  discourse  bears  plainly  the  marks 
of  Jesus'  style. 

And  in  these  passages,  we  have  to  notice,  with  an 
exception  which  will  be  spoken  of  afterwards,  Jesus 
talks  as  we  should  expect  him  to  talk  ;  he  does  not 
speak  of  a  kingdom  which  shall  be  brought  about  by 
a  visible  descent  from  heaven  and  a  visible  judgment, 
but  of  a  kingdom  of  truth,  which  is  established  by 
spreading  the  truth  which  it  has  been  his  work  to 
teach.  And  what  he  implies  here  it  is  the  express 
purpose  of  several  of  his  parables  to  state.  There  is 
the  parable  of  the  talents  :  in  this  parable  the  empha- 
sis certainly  is  not  upon  any  suddenness  or  unexpec- 
tedness in  the  lord's  arrival,  but  the  kingdom  is  made 
to  centre  about  the  use  which  is  made  of  the  opportu- 
nities in  this  life,  and  it  has  nothing  to  do  with  con- 
ditions that  differ  from  the  conditions  that  hold  at 
present.  Agreeing  with  this  is  the  emphasis  which 
Jesus  lays  upon  the  naturalness,  the  normalness  of  the 
kingdom's  growth  ;  it  is  like  a  grain  of  mustard-seed 
and  like  the  leaven  gradually  spreading  through  the 
lump,  it  falls  and  takes  root  and  bears  fruit,  or  else  it 
dies  away  without  fruition,  with  just  as  absolute  a 
dependence  on  the  natural  laws  of  growth,  as  the  seed 
which  the  sower  casts  from  his  hand.  There  are 
indeed  two  parables  which  seem  to  go  against  this, 
and  which  make  the  consummation  of  the  kingdom, 
not  the  end  of  a  natural  process,  but  a  violent  catas- 
trophe ;  but  of  one  of  these  we  fortunately  are  still  able 
to  detect  the  origin.  The  parable  of  the  wheat  and 
tares  is  connected,  by  its  position  and  by  the  elements 
which  make  it  up,  with  the  parable  of  the  growing 
seed  which  we  find  in  Mark,  and  this  suggests  at  once 
that  they  only  are  two  varying  forms  of  one  and  the 


282       Tlie  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

same  thing.  And  if  we  put  the  question  in  this  way, 
Of  two  forms  of  a  parable,  one  of  which  is  simple  and 
natural,  and  the  other  elaborate  and  allegorical,  one 
of  which  agrees  perfectly  with  Jesus'  teaching,  and  the 
other  disagrees  with  it,  which  is  most  likely  to  be  the 
original  form  ?  the  question  answers  itself.  The 
parable  of  the  growing  seed  teaches  what  the  parable 
of  the  sower  teaches,  the  perfect  naturalness  of  the 
kingdom's  growth  :  the  parable  of  the  tares  is  pro- 
fessedl)^  an  allegory  ;  it  teaches  so  manj^  things  that  it 
teaches  nothing  clearly  ;  it  does  not  represent  some- 
thing taken  from  common  life,  but  a  perfectly  strange 
and  isolated  case.  And  it  is  not  true  to  life,  as  Jesus' 
parables  are,  for  the  servants  never  would  have  asked 
so  absurd  a  question  as  to  how  tares  came  to  be  among 
the  wheat,  unless  they  had  been  quite  new  to  farming, 
and  the  master  could  not  have  known  an  enemy  had 
sown  them,  because,  under  any  circumstances,  tares 
were  likely  to  spring  up.  Indeed  the  parable,  together 
with  the  similar  parable  of  the  net  and  fishes,  betrays 
its  late  origin  by  the  way  in  which  it  presupposes  an 
organized  Church,  in  which  the  good  and  the  evil  are 
mixed  up  together.  Jesus  never  thought  of  the  king- 
dom in  this  way,  not  because  he  could  not  see  that  evil 
would  get  into  the  Church,  but  because  in  just  so  far 
it  would  have  ceased  for  him  to  be  the  kingdom, 
because  it  was  the  kingdom  only  as  it  embodied  right- 
eousness. 

And  what  from  Jesus'  parables  we  find  that  he 
believed,  we  easily  can  see  that  he  must  have  believed, 
if  we  are  not  to  attribute  to  him  a  lack  of  insight  which 
the  rest  of  his  teaching  would  not  prepare  us  for.  If 
he  saw  that  for  the  present  the  kingdom  was  a  king- 
dom of  righteousness  in  which  all  external  influence 


The  Future  of  the  Kingdom. 


over  men  was  out  of  place,  then  he  must  have  seen  that 
this  forever  would  be  so,  and  that  it  was  just  as  impos- 
sible to  set  up  the  kingdom  by  coming  in  a  cloud  from 
heaven  and  by  separating  the  wicked  from  the  good, 
as  it  was  to  establish  an  earthl}^  empire  and  to  make 
men  righteous  by  freeing  them  from  their  oppressors. 
Both  alike  had  nothing  to  do  with  the  formation  of 
character,  and  because  the  kingdom  had  to  do  with 
character,  everything  external,  every  interference  with 
the  course  of  history,  whether  it  was  present  or  future, 
natural  or  supernatural,  was  foreign  to  it.  Neverthe- 
less, while  we  may  regard  this  as  the  natural  deduction 
from  Jesus'  conception,  the  apocalyptic  element  has 
worked  itself  so  intricately  into  the  fabric  of  Jesus' 
speeches,  as  recorded  in  the  Gospels,  that  a  somewhat 
minute  inquiry  will  be  needed  to  clear  up  more  ejGFect- 
ually  Jesus'  connection  with  the  doctrine  which  ap- 
pears all  through  the  New  Testament  under  the  name 
of  the  Coming  of  the  Son  of  man. 

In  entering  upon  this  discussion,  the  passage  which 
is  the  crucial  one,  because  it  is  least  open  to  suspicion, 
is  the  discourse  about  watchfulness,  which  is  found  in 
both  Matthew  and  L,uke  ;  in  Luke  from  the  thirty-fifth 
verse  of  the  twelfth  chapter,  to  the  forty-seventh  verse. 
The  first  four  verses  of  this  section,  we  are  inclined  to 
think,  are  a  mere  abstract,  taken  from  Mark  and  from 
the  parable  of  the  virgins,  which,  as  Matthew  seems 
to  show,  stood  originally  in  this  place.  Briefly  our 
reasons  for  thinking  so  are  these  :  in  Luke  the  allusion 
to  burning  lamps  and  to  a  marriage  feast  has  no  special 
motive,  as  in  Matthew's  parable  ;  the  whole  passage  is 
confused,  and  hovers  between  the  literal  and  the  para- 
bolic ;  and  the  action  of  the  master  is  unnatural,  and 
out  of  all  proportion  to  that  which  calls  it  forth.     But 


284       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

the  rest  of  the  discourse,  in  which  Matthew  and  lyuke 
agree  and  which  no  doubt  is  genuine,  is  what  we  wish 
to  call  attention  to.  Now  this  speaks  of  a  Coming  of 
the  Son  of  man,  but  it  cannot  at  all  apply  naturally  to 
a  single  visible  appearance  once  for  all.  Naturally 
this  discourse,  together  with  the  parable  of  the  virgins, 
which  goes  along  with  it,  is  no  more  than  an  exhorta- 
tion to  constant  readiness  and  watchfulness,  and  a  warn- 
ing that  the  judgment  of  God  is  continually  hanging 
over  the  unfaithful  and  the  careless.  "  But  if  that 
servant  shall  say  in  his  heart.  My  lord  delayeth  his 
coming  ;  and  shall  begin  to  beat  the  menservants  and 
the  maidservants,  and  to  eat  and  drink,  and  to  be 
drunken  ;  the  lord  of  that  vServant  shall  come  in  a  day 
when  he  expecteth  not,  and  in  an  hour  when  he  know- 
eth  not,  and  shall  cut  him  asunder,  and  appoint  his 
portion  with  the  unfaithful."  The  Jews  had  a  final 
judgment  day  for  the  ungodly  ;  Jesus'  thought  goes 
deeper,  and  with  him  this  judgment  is  something  which 
is  occurring  daily,  wherever  there  is  unfaithfulness  and 
corruption, — "except  ye  repent  ye  shall  all  likewise 
perish."  "Whenever,"  saj^s  Jesus,  "  the  evil  serv^ant 
says  thus  in  his  heart ' '  ;  but  of  a  general  Parousia  he 
could  not  have  said  that  it  was  sure  to  come  whenever 
a  man  was  neglectful  of  his  duty.  Interpreting  these 
words,  then,  as  other  words  of  his  have  to  be  inter- 
preted, remembering  that  with  him  the  outward,  the 
sensuous  form,  is  of  small  account,  and  the  spirit,  the 
inner  meaning,  is  everything,  we  cannot  well  come  to 
any  other  conclusion.  The  only  great  objection  to  this 
is  that  such  a  judgment  is  not  very  happily  described 
as  a  Coming  of  the  Son  of  man.  This  title  has  too 
decidedly  an  apocalyptic  coloring  to  make  it  very  proba- 
ble that  Jesus  deliberately  should  have  chosen  it,  when 


The  Future  of  the  Kingdom.  285 

he  saw,  as  he  must  have  seen,  how  likely  it  was  to  lead 
his  followers  away  from  the  right  track.  There  is  no 
need,  however,  that  this  title  should  be  retained  against 
the  obvious  meaning  of  the  passage.  One  of  the  verses 
in  which  it  occurs  is  found  again  in  the  more  general 
form,  ' '  Ye  know  not  the  day  nor  the  hour ' '  ;  and  the 
other  verse,  "  Be  ye  therefore  also  ready,  for  in  an  hour 
when  ye  think  not  the  Son  of  man  cometh, ' '  is  of  the 
nature  of  a  moral  or  deduction  drawn  from  Jesus'  para- 
ble, and  we  have  seen  that  such  express  explanations 
are  always  to  be  suspected.  But  if  in  this  passage, 
where  Jesus  speaks  so  distinctly  of  judgment  and  of 
the  necessity  of  watchfulness,  he  yet  repudiates,  to  all 
intents,  the  doctrine  of  a  supernatural  coming,  we  are 
justified  in  approaching  the  passages  in  which  such  a 
doctrine  does  clearly  show  itself  with  an  added  cau- 
tion, ready  to  reject  them,  without  very  much  cere- 
mony, in  case  they  fail  to  produce  pretty  decided 
evidence  to  support  their  claims. 

And  of  these  passages,  the  parable  of  the  unjust 
judge,  which  is  found  in  Luke  alone,  need  hardly 
come  into  consideration,  because  it  is  in  the  last  degree 
doubtful  whether  it  represents  what  Jesus  really  said. 
This  parable,  or  at  any  rate  the  turn  which  is  given  to 
it  b}^  lyuke,  reveals  clearly  a  later  time.  Men  are 
beginning  to  despair  of  Christ's  coming,  they  arepraj^- 
ing  for  vengeance  upon  their  persecutors,  faith  seems 
likely  to  be  driven  from  the  earth.  How  else  are  we 
to  account  for  the  combination  of  a  long  delay  and  a 
speedy  vengeance,  unless  we  have  the  words  of  a  man 
for  whom  the  delay  was  in  the  past,  the  speedy  ven- 
geance in  the  future  ?  Then  too,  if  Jesus  spoke  these 
words,  he  taught  his  disciples  to  pray  for  vengeance 
upon  their  enemies,  and  this  also  cannot  be  admitted. 


286      The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

The  body  of  the  parable  may  indeed  be  genuine,  but 
if  it  is  genuine  it  only  is  meant  to  show,  like  the 
parable  of  the  friend  and  the  loaves,  the  difference 
between  man's  unwillingness  and  the  willingness  of 
God.  But  what,  unless  it  can  be  accounted  for,  is 
really  fatal  to  the  view  we  have  advanced,  is  the  long 
chapter  which  is  concerned  entirely  with  the  second 
coming  of  Christ.  This  is  given  by  all  of  the  Evan- 
gelists, but  if  the  three  accounts  are  compared,  it  will 
be  found  that  Matthew  as  usual  has  added  much  that 
does  not  belong  here,  and  that  the  discourse  originallj^ 
stood  much  as  it  stands  in  Mark  at  present  ;  and  so  we 
shall  follow  Mark's  form  to  avoid  confusion. 

The  meaning  of  this  discourse  as  it  stands  in  Mark 
cannot  fairly  be  questioned.  Jesus  with  much  detail 
predicts  the  fall  of  Jerusalem  and  the  prodigies  which 
are  to  attend  it,  and  immediately  after  the  catastrophe 
he  saj's  that  he  is  to  appear  in  the  clouds  of  heaven,  to 
put  an  end  to  existing  things,  and  to  introduce  a  new 
era,  an  everlasting  reign  of  the  saints.  If  language  is 
to  have  any  meaning  it  is  quite  impossible  to  spiritual- 
ize the  passage,  or  to  get  away  from  the  fact  that  the 
event  which  it  predicts  is  to  come  about  within  a 
moderate  period  of  time,  before  the  end  of  the 
existing  generation.  Before  criticising  this,  however, 
it  will  be  necessar>^  to  look  at  two  other  isolated 
sayings  in  the  Gospels  which  have  the  same  point  of 
view.  One  of  these  comes  in  a  collection  of  sayings 
which  Mark  has  made,  and  which  we  will  give  entire. 

If  any  man  would  come  after  me,  let  him  deny  himself,  and 
take  up  his  cross,  and  follow  me.  For  whosoever  would  save 
his  life  shall  lose  it ;  and  whosoever  shall  lose  his  life  for  my 
sake  and  the  gospel's  shall  save  it.  For  what  doth  it  profit  a 
man,  to  gain  the  whole  world  and  forfeit  his  life  ?    For  what 


The  Futiire  of  the  Kingdom.  287 

should  a  man  give  in  exchange  for  his  life  ?  For  whosoever 
shall  be  ashamed  of  me  and  of  my  words  in  this  adulterous  and 
sinful  generation,  the  Son  of  man  also  shall  be  ashamed  of  him, 
when  he  cometh  in  the  glory  of  his  Father  with  the  holy 
angels.  Verily  I  say  unto  you,  There  be  some  here  of  them 
that  stand  by,  which  shall  in  no  wise  taste  of  death,  till  they  see 
the  kingdom  of  God  come  with  power.     Mark  8  :  34 — 9  :  i. 

Now  this  account  has  no  independent  value  ;  it  is 
made  up  after  Mark's  fashion  out  of  sayings  which  he 
has  found  in  his  source.  The  first  two  verses  have 
their  true  place  in  Luke,'  and  the  thirty -eighth  verse  is 
probably  only  a  crude  form  of  the  saying  which  already 
has  been  met  with,  "  Whosoever  shall  deny  me  before 
men,  him  will  I  also  deny  before  my  Father  which  is 
in  heaven. ' '  The  last  verse  therefore  cannot  be  insisted 
on  as  if  it  were  undoubtedly  genuine,  and  if  we  find 
that  this  verse  also  could  have  been  taken  from  Mark's 
source,  we  cannot  hesitate  to  do  so.  And  clearly  it 
only  is  another  way  of  saying  what  actually  we  find  in 
the  chapter  on  the  second  coming,  ' '  This  generation 
shall  not  pass  away,  till  all  these  things  be  fulfilled." 
The  other  saying  which  we  have  spoken  of  involves  a 
somewhat  more  complicated  problem,  and  one  which 
requires  some  knowledge  of  the  Gospel  relations  if  it  is 
to  be  made  clear  ;  nevertheless  we  shall  try  to  make  it 
as  plain  as  possible.  In  both  Matthew  and  Luke  there 
is  found  a  discourse  against  the  fear  of  men,  which  up 
to  a  certain  point  agrees  in  both  Gospels,'  and  in  both 
Gospels,  in  connection  with  this  discourse,  there  is  also 
another  saying,  which  appears  too  in  the  chapter  on  the 
second  coming,  ' '  Be  not  anxious  what  ye  shall  speak,  for 
it  shall  be  given  you  in  that  same  hour  what  ye  ought 

'  Luke  14 :  26,  27  ;  cf.  Matt.  10 :  37-39. 
-  Matt.  10  :  26-33  ;  Luke  12  :  1-9. 


288      The  Life  and  TeacJmigs  of  yesus. 

to  speak.  For  it  is  not  ye  that  speak,  but  the  spirit  of 
your  Father  which  speaketh  in  you," — only  in  Luke 
this  saying  follows  the  discourse,  while  in  Matthew  it 
precedes.  This  saying  therefore,  we  conclude,  was 
connected  with  the  discourse  in  the  source  from  which 
lyuke  and  Matthew  both  draw  ;  but  who  is  right,  Luke 
who  puts  the  saying  after,  or  Matthew  who  places  it 
before  ?  Luke  in  all  likelihood  is  right  and  for  this 
reason,  that  the  discourse  naturally  opens  with  the 
saying  with  which  Luke  makes  it  open,  ' '  There  is 
nothing  covered  that  shall  not  be  revealed,  or  hid  that 
shall  not  be  known  ' '  ;  while  Matthew,  in  putting  this 
saying  in  the  middle  of  the  discourse,  gives  it  an  ex- 
ceedingh^  poor  connection.  And  this  leads  to  another 
question.  The  saying  about  reliance  upon  the  spirit 
of  God  occurs  also,  as  we  said  before,  in  the  chapter  on 
the  second  coming,  and  the  whole  connection  which  it 
has  in  this  chapter  Matthew  gives  in  the  passage  with 
which  we  now  are  concerned. 

But  beware  of  men  :  for  they  will  deliver  you  up  to  councils, 
and  in  their  synagogues  they  will  scourge  you  ;  yea,  and  before 
governors  and  kings  shall  ye  be  brought  for  my  sake,  for  a  tes- 
timony to  them  and.to  the  Gentiles..  But  when  they  deliver  you 
up,  be  not  anxious  how  or  what  ye  shall  speak.  For  it  shall  be 
given  you  in  that  hour  what  ye  shall  speak.  For  it  is  not  ye 
that  speak,  but  the  Spirit  of  your  Father  that  speaketh  in  you. 
And  brother  shall  deliver  up  brother  to  death,  and  the  father  his 
child  :  and  children  shall  rise  up  against  parents,  and  cause  them 
to  be  put  to  death.  And  ye  shall  be  hated  of  all  men  for  my 
name's  sake  :  but  he  that  eudureth  to  the  end,  the  same  shall  be 
saved.  But  when  they  persecute  you  in  this  city,  flee  into  the 
next :  for  verily  I  say  unto  you.  Ye  shall  not  have  gone  through 
the  cities  of  Israel,  till  the  Son  of  man  be  come.  A  disciple  is 
not  above  his  master,  nor  a  servant  above  his  lord.  It  is  enough 
for  the  disciple  that  he  be  as  his  master,  and  the  servant  as  his 
lord.  If  they  have  called  the  master  of  the  house  Beelzebub, 
how  much  more  shall  they  call  them  of  his  household ! 


The  Future  of  the  Kingdom.  289 

All  but  the  last  two  verses  of  this  passage  are  found 
iu  the  discourse  about  the  second  coming.  Was  then 
the  passage  original  iu  its  present  connection,  and  was 
it  borrowed  to  form  a  part  of  the  discourse  on  the  sec- 
ond coming?  or,  on  the  other  hand,  was  its  original 
place  in  the  chapter  on  the  second  coming,  which  bor- 
rowed onl)^  the  one  verse  about  reliance  upon  the 
Spirit,  and  did  the  first  Evangelist,  meeting  with  this 
verse,  and  remembering  its  connection  in  another  place, 
turn  to  this  place  and  quote  the  entire  passage  ? 

We  have  little  hesitation  in  saying  that  the  verses 
about  which  we  are  in  doubt  are  very  much  better 
suited  to  their  connection  in  the  chapter  on  the  second 
coming,  and  agree  perfectly  with  the  general  style  of 
that  chapter.  But  in  the  discourse  about  freedom  from 
fear  the  atmosphere  we  must  feel  is  different.  The 
sayings  are  in  Jesus'  free  and  plastic  style  ;  there  is  no 
minute  prediction  of  definite  events  :  ' '  What  ye  hear  in 
the  ear,  proclaim  upon  the  housetop  "  ;  "  Are  not  two 
sparrows  sold  for  a  farthing  ?  and  not  one  of  them 
shall  fall  to  the  ground  without  your  Father. ' '  Com- 
pare these  with  the  other  sayings,  "  They  will  deliver 
you  up  to  their  councils,  and  they  will  scourge  you  in 
the  synagogues,  and  ye  shall  be  brought  before  govern- 
ors and  kings  for  my  sake  "  ;  "  Children  shall  rise  up 
against  their  parents  and  cause  them  to  be  put  to 
death  "  ;  "  Ye  shall  be  hated  of  all  men  for  my  name's 
sake,  but  he  that  endureth  to  the  end,  the  same  shall 
be  saved  "  :  is  it  not  easy  to  see  the  difference  at  once  ? 
Moreover  when  we  let  these  sayings  fall  away  we 
have  an  excellent  connection  left.  "  Whosoever  shall 
confess  me  before  men,  him  will  I  also  confess  before 
my  Father  which  is  in  heaven  ;  and  whosoever  shall 
deny  me  before  men,  him  will  I  also  deny  before  my 


290      The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

Father  which  is  in  heaven.  And  be  not  anxious  what 
ye  shall  sa)-,  for  it  shall  be  given  you  in  that  same  hour 
what  ye  ought  to  say," — it  is  in  connection  with  con- 
fessing Jesus  before  men  that  the  saying  has  its  mean- 
ing. Then  the  last  two  verses  make  a  fitting  close  : 
' '  The  disciple  is  not  above  his  master,  or  the  servant 
above  his  lord."  We  know  that  these  verses  were  in 
the  source,  because  lyuke  gives  them  in  another  con- 
nection, although  his  connection  is  an  impossible  one. 
In  this  case  however  the  remaining  verse,  which  is 
the  one  we  have  been  aiming  at  in  all  this  discussion, 
must  also  fall  away :  "When  they  persecute  you  in 
one  city,  flee  into  another,  for  ye  shall  not  have  gone 
through  the  cities  of  Israel  till  the  Son  of  man  be 
come."  This  does  not  suit  the  rest  of  the  discourse, 
for  it  is  not  poetr>%  but  a  bald  and  literal  prediction  ; 
it  probably  was  suggested  in  the  same  way  in  which 
the  saying  in  Mark  was  suggested,  and  had  its  special 
form  determined  by  the  discourse  on  the  sending  out 
of  the  twelve  Apostles,  which  Matthew  places  just  be- 
fore. This  very  fact,  that  the  saying,  "Ye  shall  not 
have  gone  through  the  cities  of  Israel,"  points  so  un- 
mistakably to  the  mission  of  the  disciples  from  city 
to  city,  not  to  Samaria  or  heathendom,  but  to  the  lost 
sheep  of  the  house  of  Israel,  is  enough  to  show  that 
the  saying  could  not  have  belonged  to  a  discourse 
which  originally  could  have  had  no  sort  of  connection 
with  this  mission  of  the  Twelve,  because  it  had  to  do, 
not  with  events  in  Jesus'  lifetime,  but  with  events  after 
his  death. 

To  the  chapter  on  the  second  coming,  therefore, 
everything  goes  back  ;  and  of  this  chapter  what  are  we 
to  say  ?  So  much  at  any  rate,  that  of  all  the  speeches 
which  are  attributed  to  Jesus,  this  has  the  very  least 


The  Future  of  the  Kingdom.  291 


in  its  favor.     The  style  is  utterly  unlike  Jesus'  style, 
and  only  here  and  there  do  we  find  a  touch  which  re- 
minds us  in  the  least  of  him.     The  whole  is  a  list  of 
literal  predictions,  such  a  list  as  one  living  in  the  midst 
of  the  events  would  be  likely  to  draw  up  ;  there  is  no 
trace  of  spiritual  truth,  but  everything  refers  to  out- 
ward events ;    much  is  made  up  of  Old  Testament 
quotations ;    and   other   discourses   have   occasionally 
been  used.     And  when  it  is  considered,  in  addition, 
that  there  is  no  reconciling  this  with  others  of  Jesus' 
teachings,  it  is  not  too  much  to  say,  that,  in  its  present 
form,  the  discourse  cannot  possibly  have  come  from 
him.     There  is  much  probability  in  the  conjecture  that 
we  have  here  a  little  Apocalypse,  which  the  Evangelist 
has  inserted  in  his  book,  and  which  it  is  possible  that 
tradition  points  to  when  it  speaks  of  a  divine  revelation 
which  warned  the  Christians  to  flee  from  the  doomed 
city.     At  any  rate,  it  probably  was  written  when  de- 
struction was  impending.'     But  still  is  it  not  possible 
that  some  real  reminiscence  of  Jesus'  words  lies  at  the 
bottom  of  the  discourse  ?  may  not  Jesus  at  least  have 
predicted  the  fall  of  Jerusalem,  and  may  he  not    have 
said  that,  while  the  day  and  hour  were  unknown  to 
him,  the  catastrophe  was  likely  to  come  before  that 
generation  should  have  passed  away  ?     In  itself  there 
is  nothing  impossible  in  this  ;    Jesus  reproached  his 
countrymen  because  they  could  not  read  the  signs  of 
the  times,  and  he  surely  may  have  had  the  wit  to  read 
them  better.     And  if  his  predictions  were  made  a  little 
more  circumstantial,  if  an  event  so  astounding  it  was 
thought,  must  usher  in  the  coming  of  the  Son  of  man 
himself  then  the  chapter  is  sufficiently  accounted  for. 
But  what  tells  strongly  even  against  this  is  the  absence 
'  Cf.  Mk.  13  :  14. 


292       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

of  any  reference  to  such  a  prediction  in  the  rest  of  the 
New  Testament,  although  there  are  places  where  such 
a  reference  would  seem  unavoidable.  The  Apocalypse 
has  to  do  with  just  this  circle  of  ideas,  and  here  the 
destruction  of  the  Temple  seems  to  be  excluded ;  at 
any  rate  the  writer  hardly  could  have  avoided  giving 
us  a  hint  of  it,  if  he  had  been  acquainted  with  such  a 
prediction  from  the  mouth  of  Jesus.  And  in  the  letters 
to  the  Thessalonians  also,  the  prediction  hardly  would 
have  been  ignored  altogether,  and  a  knowledge  of  it 
must  have  put  some  check  upon  the  restlessness  and 
uncertainty  of  the  early  Church. 

With  the  great  discourse  on  the  second  coming  out 
of  the  way,  the  backbone  of  the  argument  for  such  a 
belief  on  Jesus'  part  is  broken.  Nevertheless  there 
still  remains  one  passage  which  deserves  consideration. 
This  is  the  discourse  which  is  found  in  the  seventeenth 
chapter  of  Luke,  and  which  Matthew  also  gives  in  a 
very  disjointed  way,  which  also  has  to  do  with  the 
coming  of  the  Son  of  man.  There  are  a  few  foreign 
elements  which  seem  to  have  got  attached  to  this  pas- 
sage :  the  twenty-fifth  verse  looks  like  a  gloss  by  the 
Evangelist  ;  the  thirty-third  belongs  to  another  dis- 
course, and  here  does  not  have  its  real  meaning  ;  and 
the  warning  which  is  given  in  the  thirty -first  verse  is 
found  also  in  the  great  chapter  on  the  second  coming, 
where  it  has  reference  to  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem, 
and  is  appropriate  enough,  while  here  it  does  not  fit  in 
well  with  the  concluding  verses.  The  catastrophe 
could  not  have  been  so  sudden  as  these  verses  repre- 
sent it,  and  still  have  given  an  opportunity  for  flight. 
But  the  rest  of  the  discourse  gives  a  fairly  consistent 
picture  :  Jesus  warns  his  disciples  not  to  be  led  astray 
by  their  longing  for  his  coming,  for  when  the  time 


The  Future  of  the  Kingdom.  293 


does  really  come,  there  will  be  no  possibility  of  mistake 
about  it.  And  the  time  will  not  come  when  men  are 
looking  for  it,  but  when  they  are  careless  and  secure. 
By  a  somewhat  violent  feat  of  interpretation,  it  is  pos- 
sible to  make  even  this  agree  with  the  results  which 
already  have  been  obtained  from  Jesus'  teaching. 
"  Wheresoever  the  carcass  is,  there  will  the  eagles  be 
gathered  together,"  is  the  way  in  which  the  discourse 
comes  to  an  end  ;  and  we  might  take  this  as  containing 
in  a  nutshell  the  whole  point  of  the  passage,  and  as 
meaning  simply  this  :  wherever  corruption  is,  there 
judgment  is  hanging  over  it,  sudden,  visible  to  all  ; 
and  in  this  judgment  the  coming  of  the  Son  of  man 
consists.  And  this  essentially  is  what  we  have  found 
already  that  Jesus  taught.  Nevertheless,  however 
tempting  this  may  be,  it  will  have  to  be  set  aside.  The 
coming  of  the  Son  of  man,  as  has  been  said,  is  not  a 
natural  name  for  such  a  judgment,  and  the  comparison 
with  lightning  refers  unmistakably  to  an  appearance 
such  as  the  early  Church  conceived  of  it.  There  is 
nothing  for  it,  then,  but  to  give  up  this  discourse  as 
well,  for,  left  alone  as  it  is,  it  cannot  stand  out  against 
the  presumption  which  has  been  raised  against  the 
doctrine  which  it  sets  forth.  And  apart  from  the  fact 
that  it  does  not  show  very  distinctly  the  marks  of 
Jesus'  style,  there  is  one  point  in  particular  to  be  made 
against  it.  It  is  connected  by  I^uke  with  the  incident 
in  which  the  Pharisees  ask  Jesus  about  the  time  of  the 
kingdom's  appearance,  and  this  incident  is  so  very 
characteristic,  it  shows  Jesus'  point  of  view  so  clearly 
in  distinction  from  the  later  point  of  view,  that  it  can- 
not easily  be  rejected.  But  the  narrative  which  con- 
ceives of  the  kingdom  as  a  future  and  supernatural 
thing,  becomes  decidedly  more  improbable  when  we 


294      ^'^^^  ^^f^  ^^^^  Teachings  of  Jesus. 


find  that  it  has  got  placed  alongside  a  narrative  in 
which  the  kingdom  stands  out  plainly  as  a  present  and 
natural  thing  ;  the  connection  at  any  rate  cannot  be 
retained.  Moreover  it  appears  that  the  discourse  on 
the  coming  of  the  Son  of  man  has  borrowed  from  the 
other,  and  this  is  suflBcient  to  condemn  it.  "  Ye  shall 
not  say,  Lo  here,  or,  Lo  there,"  says  Jesus  to  the  Phari- 
sees ;  and  he  means  that  the  kingdom  has  no  external 
marks  or  boundaries  to  know  it  by.  But,  in  the  other 
saying,  "Then  if  they  shall  say  unto  you,  Lo  here, 
or,  IvO  there,"  all  the  poetry  has  gone  out  of  the  phrase, 
and  instead  of  being  a  picturesque  way  of  putting  an 
abstract  statement,  it  is  simply  the  prophecy  of  a  literal 
fact.  And  this  repetition  of  a  phrase  in  a  different  atmos- 
phere, so  that  the  meaning  of  it  is  changed,  of  itself 
goes  far  to  throw  doubt  upon  the  passage  where  the 
repetition  occurs. 

All  this  therefore  leads  to  the  conclusion  that  Jesus 
did  not  look  for  any  supernatural  appearance  which 
was  to  change  violently  the  course  of  the  world,  but 
that  he  regarded  the  growth  of  his  kingdom  as  a  silent 
and  natural  growth  by  which  human  society  should 
gradually  be  transformed.  Doubtless  he  also  had  a 
doctrine  of  last  things,  but  precisely  what  form  this 
doctrine  took  in  his  mind  it  perhaps  is  not  possible  to 
determine  with  the  little  evidence  we  have.  In  two  or 
three  passages  Jesus  makes  use  of  the  conception  of  a 
final  judgment-day,  but  it  is  not  likely  we  can  attribute 
to  him  safely  anything  beyond  the  kernal  of  this  doc- 
trine, any  more  than  in  the  case  of  the  doctrine  of 
Gehenna,  which  Jesus  also  makes  use  of  in  figurative 
passages.  The  only  exception  to  this  is  in  the  great 
judgment  scene  which  is  found  in  Matthew  ;  but  while 
this  naturally  seems  to  show  a  belief  in  a  literal  judg- 


The  Future  of  the  Kingdom.  295 

ment-day,  it  hardly  is  to  be  attributed  to  Jesus,  in  spite 
of  the  undeniable  beauty  of  its  teaching.  Two  doc- 
trines appear  in  the  passage,  which  were  held  to 
strongly  in  later  times,  but  which  it  is  improbable  that 
Jesus  taught  :  the  coming  of  the  Son  of  man,  and  the 
eternal  punishment  of  the  wicked  in  its  most  literal 
sense.  I^ikewise  the  kingdom  is  spoken  of  in  a  man- 
ner very  unusual  with  Jesus,  as  something  belonging 
to  the  future  ;  and  the  position  of  supremacy  which 
Jesus  is  made  to  assume  in  relation  to  his  followers, 
and  the  recognition  of  this  supremacy  among  all  na- 
tions, is  as  little  like  Jesus'  ordinary  tone  as  it  is  per- 
fectly in  accord  with  later  theologies,  in  which  Jesus' 
Messiahship  had  taken  the  place  of  first  importance, 
and  when  the  Gospel  had  spread  over  the  world.  The 
imagery  moreover  does  not  show  the  taste  of  Jesus,  for 
the  abrupt  interjection  of  the  metaphor  of  the  sheep 
and  goats,  while  the  rest  of  the  passage  is  literal,  is  a 
fault  which  Jesus  never  would  have  been  guilty  of. 
The  objective  way  in  which  Jesus  is  spoken  of  through- 
out makes  it  probable  that  whoever  first  was  the  author 
of  the  passage  did  not  intend  it  should  be  put  in  Jesus' 
mouth.  That  Jesus  did  believe  in  a  future  world  is 
put  beyond  doubt  by  the  argument  in  favor  of  it  which 
he  addresses  to  the  Sadducees.  The  argument  is 
probably  not  the  merelj'-  verbal  argument  which  at 
first  sight  it  might  seem  to  be,  for  Jesus  is  very  little 
given  to  playing  upon  words.  Most  likely  at  the 
bottom  of  his  argument  there  Ues  the  thought  that 
God  could  not  thus  belittle  himself  in  solemnly  declar- 
ing that  he  was  the  God  of  men  whose  ephemeral  exist- 
ence had  long  since  been  cut  short ;  in  other  words, 
the  fact  that  men  stood  in  relationship  to  God  pointed 
them  out  as  immortal  beings.     But  at  any  rate  Jesus' 


296      The  Life  afid  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

answer  throws  a  gleam  of  light  upon  the  doctrine 
which  he  held,  and  shows  that  it  was  no  sensuous  and 
bodily  form  of  life  that  he  looked  forward  to,  but  that 
it  involved  a  great  change  from  human  conditions. 
More  than  this  it  is  hardly  safe  to  say.  And  likewise 
as  regards  his  belief  about  the  punishment  of  the 
wicked,  it  is  certain  that  Jesus  insists  upon  the  punish- 
ment which  wrongdoing  must  ever  bring  in  its  train  ; 
but  what  the  nature  of  that  punishment  shall  be,  or 
what  shall  be  its  time  relations,  he  does  not  seek  to 
settle.  All  such  speculations  lie  without  the  range  of 
the  eternal  principles  on  which  Jesus  founded  his 
beliefs. 


CHAPTER  VII. 

THE  GAXII^EAN  MINISTRY. 

THERE  is  a  great  temptation,  in  trying  to  recon- 
struct the  details  of  Jesus'  life,  to  act  with 
somewhat  more  tenderness  towards  the  Gospel 
narratives  than  can  be  wholly  justified,  and  to  grasp  at 
whatever  in  particular  instances  may  be  used  to  save 
the  credit  of  the  story,  without  enough  bearing  in 
mind  the  treacherousness  in  general  of  the  tradition 
which  we  have  to  do  with.  So  long  as  the  Gospels 
are  regarded  as  upon  the  whole  a  credible  record  of 
history,  a  certain  caution  in  admitting  of  mistakes  is 
of  course  quite  proper,  though  this  caution  often  has 
been  carried  to  extremes.  If  however  it  is  admitted 
that  the  reports  which  have  reached  us  are  so  thor- 
oughly honey-combed  with  legend,  we  no  longer  have 
the  right  to  pretend  that  there  is  a  very  large  or  a  very 
secure  residue  left  behind.  A  very  natural  hesitancy 
about  wholly  giving  up  possessions  we  have  cherished 
has  caused  men  steadily  to  approach  the  Gospels  with 
the  thought  of  saving  everything  they  were  not  ab- 
solutely forced  to  let  go  their  hold  of.  Accordingly, 
if  there  was  a  narrative  which  in  itself  was  not  im- 
possible, they  have  preferred  not  to  scrutinize  too  care- 
fully the  company  in  which  it  is  presented  to  them. 

297 


298       The  Life  and  TeacJii7igs  of  Jesus. 

But  this  is  not  the  method  of  histor5\  The  question 
of  histor}'  is  not,  How  much  of  our  material  can  be 
retained  without  positive  contradiction?  but,  What 
probably  is  true?  If  the  most  of  what  a  particular 
Evangelist  tells  us  is  surely  legendar}^,  and  then  we 
come  upon  something  which  has  no  great  unlikelihood, 
it  is  not  enough  to  saj^  that  it  maj^  be  true,  but  we 
must  have  something  to  show  pretty  clearly  that  it 
cannot  easily  be  otherwise.  We  must  therefore  resign 
ourselves  to  the  conclusion,  however  unpalatable  it 
may  be,  that  the  purely  historical  matter  which  the 
Gospels  can  furnish  will  at  the  best  be  meagre,  and 
that  for  facts  which  can  be  depended  on  with  perfect 
securit}',  it  will  be  necessarj^  to  limit  ourselves  pretty 
much  to  the  actual  sayings  of  Jesus,  or  to  such  narra- 
tives as  are  closely  bound  up  with  a  saying. 

Probably  soon  after  the  imprisonment  of  John  the 
Baptist  Jesus  entered  upon  the  work  to  which  he  had 
given  up  his  life.  It  was  with  no  blare  of  trumpets 
that  he  went  about  his  ministry.  Moving  quietly  from 
place  to  place,  mixing  in  the  homely  life  of  the  Gali- 
lean peasants,  talking  of  righteousness  and  the  king- 
dom wherever  he  could  find  an  audience — who  was  to 
guess  that  a  new  and  tremendous  force  had  come  into 
the  world?  The  Gospels  are  inclined  to  represent 
Jesus  as  if  he  had  been  constantly  on  the  move, 
hurrying  about  through  all  Galilee  from  city  to  city. 
This,  which  is  intelligible  if  Jesus  had  no  deeper  mes- 
sage than  his  own  Messiahship,  hardly  works  in  so 
well  with  a  message  which  required,  as  the  message  of 
the  kingdom  did,  that  it  should  be  so  drilled  and  ham- 
mered into  men  before  it  stood  any  show  of  true  accept- 
ance ;  and  it  is  more  likel}',  as  is  indicated  by  one  of 
Jesus'  sayings,  that  the  bulk  of  his  ministry  was  con- 


The  Galilean  Ministry.  299 

fined  to  a  comparatively  small  region  about  the  north- 
ern shore  of  the  Sea  of  Galilee,  and  centring  in  the 
cities  of  Capernaum,  Chorazin,  and  Bethsaida.  Tradi- 
tion has  it,  and  probably  has  it  rightly,  that  Capernaum 
was  made  in  a  manner  the  seat  of  his  labors,  although 
the  statement  which  Matthew  makes,  depending  partly 
upon  prophecy,  and  which  is  implied  in  Mark  as  well,' 
that  Jesus  had  a  house  there,  does  not  agree  with  Jesus' 
statement  that  the  ' '  Son  of  man  hath  not  a  place  to  lay 
his  head." 

It  was  not  long  before  the  fame  of  Jesus  began  to 
spread.  Possessed  as  he  was  of  a  natural  and  win- 
ning eloquence,  the  curiosity  of  the  volatile  Galileans 
would  quickly  bring  crowds  together  to  him,  and,  once 
there,  they  would  be  held  there  by  stronger  bonds. 
His  authority,  his  straightforwardness,  his  freedom 
from  all  the  subtilties  and  trivialness  of  the  Pharisaic 
.  teaching,  appealed  to  them  as  earnestness  and  simplic- 
ity, backed  by  the  power  of  righteousness  and  the  call 
to  duty,  must  always  appeal.  Jesus  seems  moreover 
to  have  had  a  peculiar  influence  over  the  affections  of 
men.  The  more  degraded  parts  of  the  community  in 
particular,  to  whose  despair  Jesus'  words  of  tenderness 
and  forgiveness  brought  an  unlooked-for  gleam  of  hope, 
seem  to  have  repaid  him  with  a  passionate  love.  Even 
the  higher  classes  of  the  nation  could  not  remain  unaf- 
fected by  the  charm  of  one  whose  wit  was  so  keen  and 
whose  insight  so  acute,  and  we  read  of  one  scribe  at 
least  who  wished  to  be  reckoned  as  a  follower  of  his. 

Nevertheless  Jesus'  popularity  did  not  deceive  him 
for  a  moment  into  thinking  that  his  task  was  to  prove 
an  easy  one.  He  saw  that  to  interest  the  people  and 
arouse  their  enthusiasm  was  a  very  different  thing  from 

^  See  Mk.  3  :  20,  and  cf.d:  4. 


300      The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

effecting  the  permanent  revolution  in  their  character 
and  conceptions  which  he  had  set  about  doing.  It  was 
with  this  in  his  mind  that  he  began  to  look  about  him 
for  a  closer  band  of  disciples,  whom  he  might  keep  more 
constantly  under  his  own  personal  influence,  and  so 
might  get  the  chance  to  mould  to  his  own  purposes. 
The  story  of  the  disciples  belongs  to  the  history  of  the 
Church,  and  the  most  general  account  of  them  will  be 
sufiicient  here.  That  they  were  twelve  in  number  may 
be  taken  as  settled  by  Paul's  testimony,  and  their 
names,  which  are  given  first  by  Mark,  are  so  naturally 
the  property  of  tradition,  that  we  may  take  the  list  as 
at  least  approximately  correct.  Luke  changes  the 
name  of  Thaddseus  to  Judas,  though  why  he  does  so 
is  uncertain,  and  the  first  Evangelist  identifies  Matthew 
with  Levi  the  publican.  Possiblj^  this  identification 
came  about  through  a  correct  tradition  that  Matthew 
had  been  a  publican  ;  at  any  rate,  the  identification 
itself  is  scarcely  to  be  defended.  For  to  Mark  is  due 
both  the  story  of  Levi  and  the  notice  of  the  calling  of 
the  Twelve,  so  that  it  is  evident  Mark  meant  to  point 
them  out  as  different  men.  Moreover  one  cannot  help 
the  suspicion  that  the  Levi  of  Mark  never  had  any  real 
existence.  To  begin  with,  Mark's  methods  are  so 
doubtful  that  the  very  fact  a  story  comes  from  him  is 
no  slight  evidence  against  it.  Now  it  happens  that  in 
Luke  there  is  a  series  of  sayings  for  which  the  saying 
about  the  whole  and  the  sick,  which  is  connected  with 
Levi's  call,  would  furnish  an  excellent  introduction ' ; 
and  that  the  saying  originally  did  stand  there  is  indi- 
cated by  the  reminiscences  of  it  which  Luke  has  in  a 
verse  of  this  passage  which  he  is  himself  responsible 
for  :   ' '  There  is  joy  over  one  sinner  that  repenteth^  more 

'  See  Luke  15  :  \ff. 


The  Galilean  Ministry.  301 

than  over  ninety  and  nine  righteous  persons  who  need 
no  repentence. ' '  The  passage  begins  with  a  statement 
that  the  Pharisees  were  murmuring  because  Jesus  ate 
with  sinners  ;  and  it  is  just  in  Mark's  fashion  to  take 
this  up,  and  make  it  more  vivid  by  giving  a  special 
instance  of  it,  and  by  adding  names  and  details.  And 
this  is  made  more  probable  by  the  resemblance  which 
the  abrupt  and  startling  call  of  I^evi  has  to  the  equally 
abrupt  call  of  the  other  four  disciples  which  Mark 
relates.  In  both  cases  it  is  the  evident  intention  of  the 
narrative  to  give  dramatic  force  by  representing  the 
call  as  entirely  without  preparation,  and  the  obedience 
as  coming  from  the  instantaneously  exerted  power  of 
Jesus.  This  is  without  probability  in  itself,  and  the 
fact  that  it  comes  from  Mark  is  sufi&cient  to  condemn  it. 
To  the  training  of  these  few  disciples  Jesus  turned 
himself  more  and  more,  as  he  saw  that,  so  far  as  the 
great  mass  of  the  people  was  concerned,  he  was  failing 
of  his  purpose.  The  reasons  for  this  failure  appear  in 
Jesus'  own  utterances.  In  the  first  place  the  people 
were  too  deeply  immersed  in  their  material  ideals. 
' '  From  the  days  of  John  the  Baptist  until  now  the 
kingdom  of  heaven  suffereth  violence,  and  the  men  of 
violence  take  it  by  force."  John  had  aroused  the 
popular  enthusiasm,  but  it  had  taken  a  wrong  course, 
and  the  people  were  bent  upon  a  kingdom  of  violence, 
of  political  changes.  Even  more  however  it  was  to 
the  spiritual  leaders  of  the  nation  that  Jesus  owed  his 
lack  of  success  :  ' '  Ye  have  shut  the  kingdom  of 
heaven  against  men,"  says  Jesus;  "ye  enter  not  in 
yourselves,  neither  suffer  ye  them  that  are  entering  in 
to  enter  ;"  this  is  the  motive  of  his  terrible  indictment 
of  them.  We  cannot  perhaps  hope  after  these  years 
to  trace  with  very  great  detail   the  progress  of  the 


302       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 


quarrel  between  Jesus  and  the  Pharisees,  but  yet  a 
good  deal  of  material  which  bears  upon  that  quarrel 
is  still  present  in  the  Gospels,  and  the  main  lines  of  it 
are  fairly  distinct.  It  is  not  to  be  wondered  at  that 
many  of  the  Pharisees,  whose  very  life  was  in  the 
reward  of  praise  and  veneration  which  their  piety 
brought  them,  viewed  with  no  very  friendly  eyes  the 
rise  of  a  new  teacher,  without  the  technical  training  of 
the  Scribe,  who  bid  fair  to  outstrip  them  all  in  popular- 
ity. There  would  be  no  very  weighty  pretext  needed 
therefore  to  bring  their  religious  prejudices  into  line 
with  their  personal  feelings,  and  enable  them  to  gloss 
over  their  selfishness  by  an  appeal  to  the  glory  of  God. 
They  did  not  have  to  go  far  in  order  to  find  an  occasion. 
Jesus  from  the  very  start  had  acted  flatly  in  opposition 
to  the  notions  which  in  the  typical  Pharisee's  mind 
made  up  the  sum  and  substance  of  religion.  Presently 
the  Pharisees  began  to  find  fault.  Jesus  was  not  keep- 
ing the  traditions  of  the  elders,  they  complained ;  he 
was  associating  himself  with  men  who  must  of  neces- 
sity defile  him  :  and  what,  reasoned  the  pious  Pharisee, 
was  any  hypothetical  good  to  the  sinner  in  comparison 
with  the  honor  of  God's  law.  Again,  he  did  not 
trouble  himself  or  his  disciples  to  go  through  with  all 
the  requisite  washings  and  purifications  which  the 
wisdom  of  the  Elders  had  devised.  Jesus'  disciples  ate 
and  drank  when  they  should  be  fasting.  Nay,  more, 
he  was  even  encroaching  upon  the  sanctity  of  the 
Sabbath  itself,  and  making  it  a  cheap  and  common 
thing.  It  is  unnecessary  to  ask  in  just  what  proportion 
sincerity  and  selfish  passions  were  mingled  in  the 
Pharisees'  complaints.  No  doubt  they  were  sincere  in 
their  own  fashion  ;  they  really  did  regard  Jesus  as  a 
dangerous  leveller  and  heretic,  who  was  working  to 


The  Galilean  Ministry.  303 

destroy  the  religion  once  for  all  delivered  to  the  saints. 
But  this  does  not  lessen  the  blame  attaching  to  them, 
and  their  chiefest  condemnation,  as  Jesus  pointed  out, 
was  that  with  eyes  wide  open  they  could  look  upon  the 
handiwork  of  God's  own  Spirit  and  give  it  to  the  devil, 
that  they  could  do  the  devil's  work  and  still  believe 
they  were  offering  God  service.  The  calm  and  con- 
vincing answers  which  Jesus  gave  to  their  complaints 
they  made  no  effort  to  understand,  but  only  were  irri- 
tated the  more.  From  resenting  actual  violations  of 
tradition  on  Jesus'  part  they  began  to  hunt  up  occasions 
against  him.  They  plied  him  with  questions  designed 
to  arouse  an  oditan  theologicimi,  or  even  to  bring  him 
into  disrepute  with  the  authorities.  And  the  fact  that 
they  always  were  worsted  in  their  arguments  did  not 
tend  to  make  their  resentment  any  the  less  keen. 

Meanwhile  Jesus  apparently  had  gone  about  his 
work  quietly  and  persistently,  and  had  been  content 
for  the  most  part  with  assuming  the  defensive  against 
his  enemies.  But  presently  there  came  a  new  move  on 
the  part  of  his  opponents.  Perceiving  that  Jesus  could 
not  be  conquered  by  argument,  they  began  to  strike  at 
him  in  a  more  vulnerable  place,  and  to  seek  to  under- 
mine his  influence  with  the  people.  The  worst  con- 
struction was  put  upon  his  actions,  and  his  name  was 
bandied  about  as  a  glutton  and  a  drunkard.  Slanders 
began  to  be  circulated  about  him,  such  as  that  he  was 
an  emissary  of  Beelzebub.  It  was  demanded  that  he 
should  attest  his  authority  by  miraculous  means,  in 
order  that  his  failure  to  do  so  might  discredit  him  with 
the  wonder-loving  populace.  It  was  inevitable  that  the 
influence  of  those  who  sat  in  Moses'  seat,  and  to  whom 
the  people  had  grown  accustomed  to  look  up  to  as  their 
natural  religious  teachers,  when  cast  well-nigh   unani- 


304       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  yesns. 

mously  ill  one  direction,  should  in  the  long  run  bear  its 
fruit.  It  was  in  vain  that  Jesus  gave  his  warnings  ;  a 
sevenfold  demon  of  perversitj^  seemed  to  have  entered 
the  nation  and  its  leaders.  We  become  conscious  of 
an  altered  tone  in  Jesus'  words  ;  he  warns  them  of  the 
judgment  which  is  close  upon  the  nation  unless  they 
repent,  a  judgment  pointed  to  by  no  supernatural  signs, 
but  by  such  as  their  own  eyes  might  behold  if  they 
would  but  look,  just  as  they  see  the  signs  of  drought 
and  rain.  If  thej^  will  not  look,  if  the  ver>'  eye  that  is 
given  them  for  light  be  turned  to  darkness,  how  great 
must  they  expect  that  darkness  to  be  !  If  the  tree 
yields  no  fruit,  and  even  after  an  excess  of  pains  upon 
it  shows  that  its  usefulness  is  over,  what  advantage  is 
there  in  its  cumbering  the  ground?  Indeed  it  must 
have  been  plain  to  any  one  not  blinded  by  national 
partiality  that  heroic  measures  were  necessary  to  save 
a  nation  thus  compounded  of  dead  formalism  and  blind 
fanaticism.  Whether  Jesus  ever  openly  proclaimed 
that  other  nations  were  to  come  into  the  inheritance 
which  Israel  had  refused,  is  a  little  more  uncertain,  but 
there  can  be  no  question  that  he  himself  realized  the 
universality  of  his  message,  and  the  parable  of  the 
rich  man's  supper,  and  the  discourse  about  the  narrow 
gate,  although  they  are  not  certainly  genuine,  are 
most  likely  so,  and  they  make  the  announcement  of  the 
fact  explicit. 

To  Jesus  we  cannot  doubt  that  these  were  days  of 
bitter  trial.  In  spite  of  their  utter  baselessness,  the 
taunts  of  his  enemies  hurt  him.  In  one  of  his  later 
discourses  we  find,  by  an  allusion  to  it,  that  the  old 
charge  about  Beelzebub  had  not  even  then  lost  its 
sting.  More  and  more  he  turned  himself  to  the  quiet 
instruction  of  his  disciples,  content  to   wait  for  the 


The  Galilean  Minishy.  305 

future,  when  what  he  told  in  the  ear  should  by  them 
be  proclaimed  upon  the  house-tops,  with  better  chances 
of  success  than  at  the  present.  But  even  his  disciples, 
though  they  had  made  a  start  in  the  right  direction, 
fell  sadly  short  of  what  Jesus  had  a  right  to  expect 
from  them.  Towards  the  very  close  of  his  ministry 
we  find  two  of  them,  fired  by  just  the  spirit  of  ambition 
and  self-seeking  which  Jesus  was  trying  so  patiently  to 
ween  them  from,  asking  for  the  places  of  honor  in  the 
kingdom,  the  same  limited  and  gross  old  kingdom  of 
an  earthly  ideal ;  and  something  of  a  sigh  still  breathes 
through  Jesus'  words  as  he  answers  them,  "Ye  know 
not  what  ye  are  asking. ' '  And  then  all  of  the  disciples 
begin  to  fight  among  themselves  with  jealous  rivalry, 
and  Jesus  patiently  goes  back  and  gives  their  lesson  to 
them  over  again  once  more.  In  his  own  family,  too, 
it  is  probable  that  Jesus  suffered.  The  narratives 
which  Mark  gives  of  this  are  indeed  doubtful,  but  it 
may  be  considered  likely  that  Mark  had  the  fact  to  go 
upon,  and  besides,  this  may  very  well  be  the  sense  of 
the  somewhat  enigmatical  passage  which  L,uke  gives 
in  the  twelfth  chapter.  ' '  I  came  to  cast  fire  upon  the 
earth  ;  and  what  will  I,  if  it  is  already  kindled  ?  But 
I  have  a  baptism  to  be  baptized  with  ;  and  how  am  I 
straitened  till  it  be  accomplished  !  Think  ye  that  I 
am  come  to  give  peace  on  the  earth  ?  I  tell  you.  Nay  ; 
but  rather  division  :  for  there  shall  be  from  henceforth 
five  in  one  house  divided,  three  against  two,  and  two 
against  three.  They  shall  be  divided,  father  against 
son,  and  son  against  father;  mother  against  daughter, 
and  daughter  against  mother;  mother-in-law  against  her 
daughter-in-law,  and  daughter-in-law  against  her 
mother-in-law."  This  passage  probably  was  in  the 
source,  for  Matthew's  phrase,    "cast  peace,"    is  less 


3o6      The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

natural  than  "cast  fire,"  and  shows  a  reminiscence  of 
it  ;  and  the  other  phrase,  "a  baptism  to  be  baptized 
with,"  is  repeated  by  Mark  in  the  account  of  the  request 
of  James  and  John,'  where  the  use,  contrary  to  Mat- 
thew, of  two  phrases  to  express  a  single  idea,  is  awk- 
ward. Now  if  Jesus  had  just  been  suflfering  from  hos- 
tility in  his  own  family,  this  would  explain  his  choice 
of  family  discord  as  an  example  of  the  effect  the  Gospel 
was  to  have,  and  it  would  give  a  more  personal  mean- 
ing to  the  opening  clause.  I  am  come  to  sow  discord, 
says  Jesus,  and  what  right  have  I  to  complain  if  I  am 
the  first  to  suffer  from  it?  It  only  is  a  part  of  the 
baptism  of  suffering  which  I  know  my  work  must 
bring  to  me. 

The  Passover  drew  on,  and  Jesus  determined  to  go 
up  to  Jerusalem.  Whether  he  had  visited  the  city 
before  since  his  ministry  opened,  it  seems  impossible 
to  say.  The  only  passage  which  bears  very  closely  on 
the  question  is  the  lament  over  Jerusalem,  and  this,  in 
spite  of  its  poetical  beauty,  it  does  not  seem  easy  to 
attribute  to  Jesus.  The  woes  against  the  Pharisees 
close  with  a  highly  dramatic  outburst  against  the  Jew- 
ish people.  "  Therefore,  behold,  I  send  unto  you 
prophets,  and  wise  men,  and  scribes  :  some  of  them 
shall  ye  kill  and  crucify ;  and  some  of  them  shall  ye 
scourge  in  your  synagogues  and  persecute  from  city  to 
city  :  that  upon  you  may  come  all  the  righteous  blood 
shed  on  the  earth,  from  the  blood  of  Abel  the  righteous 
to  the  blood  of  Zachariah,  whom  ye  slew  between  the 
sanctuary  and  the  altar.  Verily  I  say  unto  you,  All 
these  things  shall  come  upon  this  generation."  Now 
the  way  in  which  this  passage  mentions  scribes  goes  to 
show  that  it  comes  from  an  adherent  of  the  Pharisees, 

'  Mk.  lo :  38. 


The  Galilean  Ministry.  307 

and  that  at  least  it  does  not  belong  to  a  discourse  which 
was  devoted  to  a  condemnation  of  the  scribes.  Then 
too  in  no  natural  sense  could  Jesus  speak  of  himself 
as  sending  to  them  prophets.  But  in  I^uke  the  passage 
opens  with  the  words,  ' '  On  this  account  the  Wisdom 
of  God  saith,"  and  this  expression  seems  to  have  been 
taken  from  the  source.  For  not  only  otherwise  is 
lyuke's  insertion  of  it  not  easy  to  explain,  but  Matthew 
also  starts  in  with  "on  this  account,"  and  what  has 
gone  before  does  not  give  the  reason  for  the  sending, 
but,  as  in  lyuke,  the  reason  why  the  words  are  quoted. 
All  the  difficulty  therefore  is  got  rid  of,  if  we  suppose 
that  we  have  here  a  quotation  from  some  lost  book  in 
which  Wisdom  is  represented  as  the  speaker.  Now 
the  lament  over  Jerusalem  probably  is  a  part  of  the 
same  passage,  for  Matthew  places  them  together,  and 
the  style  is  all  of  a  piece  ;  the  one  then  who  would 
have  gathered  the  children  of  Jerusalem  together,  is 
the  one  who  had  sent  prophets  and  wise  men  and 
scribes.  And  this  enables  us  to  let  ' '  often  ' '  have  its 
proper  meaning,  and  not  limit  it  to  the  very  few  visits 
which  at  best  Jesus  could  have  made  to  the  capital. 
And  finally  this  explains  the  sentence  where  it  is  said 
that  the  speaker  shall  not  again  be  seen  until  they  are 
ready  to  greet  him  with  the  cry,  "  Blessed  is  he  that 
Cometh  in  the  name  of  the  I^ord."  These  words  only 
are  appropriate  in  the  mouth  of  one  who  is  just  on  the 
point  of  turning  his  back  upon  the  city  of  his  own 
accord,  as  Wisdom  might  well  be  conceived  as  doing, 
and  who  refuses  to  return  until  the  inhabitants  shall 
have  changed  their  minds.  But  if  Jesus  spoke  them, 
and  then  went  on  to  teach  in  the  Temple,  they  lose 
their  point,  and  they  cannot  easily  be  made  to  refer  to 
a  violent  taking  away  by  death. 


3o8       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

The  Gospels  clearly  have  the  idea  that  Jesus  went 
up  to  Jerusalem  with  a  full  knowledge  of  what  was  to 
befall  him  there.  There  is  no  likelihood  in  this,  how- 
ever, which  makes  his  death  but  little  less  than  self- 
destruction.  Nevertheless  it  is  probable  that  already 
his  opponents  had  begun  to  cherish  the  thought  of 
getting  rid  of  him  by  violent  means.  Their  hatred  had 
been  still  more  inflamed  by  the  incisive  way  in  which 
Jesus  had  from  time  to  time  shown  up  their  own 
hypocrisy  and  worthlessness.  The  last  and  greatest 
denunciation  of  them  may  have  been  brought  about  in 
the  capital  itself,  but  already  it  is  likely,  as  in  the  in- 
stance when  they  disputed  with  him  about  the  washing 
of  hands,  that  he  had  let  his  scorn  of  their  miserable 
casuistry,  which  could  pervert  the  Law  of  God  to  the 
most  selfish  ends,  lead  him  into  a  more  searching  criti- 
cism of  their  conduct  than  they  cared  to  listen  to.  He 
had  found  them  wanting,  too,  in  more  general  parables, 
such  as  the  parable  of  the  two  sons,  and  had  placed 
them,  at  least  by  implication,  even  below  the  despised 
publicans.  It  was  in  Jerusalem  however  that  the 
crisis  came  about  at  last.  According  to  the  Gospels 
the  final  attack  of  the  Pharisees  was  brought  on  by  an 
act  on  the  part  of  Jesus  which  really  was  a  direct 
declaration  of  hostility,  the  cleansing  of  the  Temple  ; 
and  possibly  the  Gospels  may  be  right  in  this.  It  is 
true  that  this  act  is  not  at  all  in  the  character  of  Jesus, 
but  shows  rather  the  spirit  of  the  older  prophets  ;  and 
to  us  it  seems  not  only  useless,  but  it  seems  needlessly 
to  have  provoked  the  hostility  of  his  enemies.  It  is 
possible  though  that  Jesus'  indignation  may  have  led 
him  to  do  what  ordinarily  he  would  have  avoided  do- 
ing. What  makes  the  account  much  more  doubtful  is 
its  apparent  physical  impossibility.     It  is  not  easy  to 


The  Galilean  Ministry.  309 

see  how  Jesus  could  have  done  what  the  Gospels  repre- 
sent him  as  doing,  even  by  making  use  of  a  violence 
which  we  must  decidedly  refuse  to  admit.  On  the 
other  hand,  without  some  foundation  it  is  rather  diffi- 
cult to  see  how  the  story^  got  about,  and  there  appar- 
ently is  connected  with  it  a  question  of  the  chief  priests 
which  by  all  means  appears  genuine,  the  question  as  to 
what  authority  Jesus  had  for  acting  as  he  did.  This 
question  naturally  implies  that  Jesus  had  done  some- 
thing out  of  the  way,  something  which  had  aroused  a 
suspicion  in  the  minds  of  the  rulers.  Once  before  no 
doubt  the  same  question  practically  had  been  put  to 
him,  when  it  was  demanded  that  he  should  give  a  sign  ; 
but  there  is  an  important  difference  between  the  two 
incidents — the  question  which  there  had  been  asked 
by  the  Pharisees  as  a  trap  for  Jesus,  now,  if  we  may 
trust  the  account,  comes  from  the  Sadducean,  the  aris- 
tocratic party  as  well.  Now  it  is  clear  that  both  the 
Pharisees  and  the  Sadducees  had  a  hand  in  Jesus' 
death,  and  the  Sadducees  appear  to  have  been  no  less 
eager  for  it  than  their  rivals.  But  their  hostility  could 
not  have  had  the  same  grounds ;  Jesus'  attitude 
towards  tradition,  which  gave  so  much  oflfence  to  the 
Pharisees,  might  to  them  have  been  even  a  matter  of 
satisfaction.  If  actually  they  did  join  the  Pharisees, 
this  seems  only  to  be  explained  if  the  Pharisees  had 
been  able  to  convince  them  that  Jesus  had  political 
designs,  and  for  this  some  act  of  Jesus  which  would 
give  color  to  the  charge  is  not  improbable.  Therefore, 
while  we  do  not  think  that  the  event  could  have  been 
just  as  the  Gospels  describe  it,  some  basis  for  the 
account  there  probably  was,  although  we  do  not  now 
feel  able  to  determine  just  wherein  this  consisted. 
And  now  Jesus'  enemies  found  an  ally  in  one  of 


3IO       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

Jesus'  own  disciples.  What  gave  rise  to  this  resolu- 
tion in  Judas'  mind  we  only  can  conjecture,  for  we 
have  verj'  little  more  than  the  fact  of  the  betrayal  to 
go  upon.  We  can  guess  however  motives  which  may 
have  led  him  on.  Judas,  no  more  than  the  other  disci- 
ples, came  to  Jesus  in  the  first  place  with  the  idea  that 
he  should  find  in  him  the  Messiah  ;  and  when  the  other 
disciples,  following  in  the  lead  of  Peter,  began  to  have 
a  dawning  sense  of  the  truth  about  their  Master,  the 
new  revelation  only  left  him  in  bewildered  uncertainty. 
For  the  life  of  him  he  could  not  dispossess  himself  of 
the  old  ideals,  and  that  Jesus  should  lay  claim  to  the 
Messianic  dignity,  and  then  go  straight  against  all  that 
he  looked  and  hoped  for  from  the  Messiah,  might 
arouse  in  him  a  feeling  of  protest  and  even  of  resent- 
ment. It  would  be  harsh  to  blame  him  too  unspar- 
ingly for  this,  in  view  of  the  fact  that  the  other 
disciples  as  well  had  got  but  little  farther  on,  and  to 
the  very  end  of  their  lives  only  had  succeeded  in  com- 
prehending Jesus'  meaning  dimly.  And  then  when 
Judas  found  the  whole  array  of  the  piety  and  learning 
of  the  nation  standing  over  against  the  new  teacher, 
it  might  well  give  added  strength  to  the  doubts  and 
suspicions  which  already  had  sprung  up  in  his  own 
mind.  Still  this  does  not  give  an  adequate  motive  for 
his  treachery,  and  this  perhaps  we  are  to  look  for  in 
fears  for  his  own  personal  safety.  What  influences 
had  been  brought  to  bear  upon  him  we  do  not  know, 
but  it  is  unlikely  that  Judas  proceeded  absolutely  of  his 
own  initiation.  This,  it  is  true,  is  the  idea  which  the 
Gospels  give,  but  the  Gospels  had  no  means  of  know- 
ing the  inside  history  of  the  case,  and  naturally  would 
take  the  alternative  which  was  least  complimentary  to 
the  traitor.     The   Pharisees  must  have  kept  a  sharp 


The  Galileaii  Ministry. 


311 


eye  on  the  little  circle  about  Jesus,  and  have  taken 
note  of  any  symptoms  of  discontent  which  might  be 
made  to  serve  their  purposes.  Perhaps  it  was  some 
intimation  of  the  plans  that  had  been  set  on  foot  that 
frightened  him  to  action  that  he  might  keep  his  own 
skin  whole,  perhaps  it  was  the  hope  of  some  substan- 
tial reward  along  with  this  which  finally  decided  him 
upon  his  course  ;  at  any  rate  the  resolution  was  made, 
and  it  only  was  left  to  find  a  convenient  opportunity. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 


THE  LAST  DAYS  OF  JESUS. 


THE  exact  facts  of  the  next  few  daj^s,  or  weeks,  as 
the  case  may  be,  are  exceedingly  difiicult  to  de- 
termine, for  the  different  sources  which  make  up 
the  substance  of  our  Gospels  are  here  not  always  easy 
to  disentangle,  and  even  when  the  separation  is  made 
and  the  earliest  account  is  got  at,  it  is  hard  to  say 
where  legend  begins  and  history  leaves  off.  So  far  as 
Matthew  and  Luke  are  concerned,  our  criticism  of  the 
Gospels  leaves  us  little  option  in  giving  up  whatever 
can  be  shown  to  come  from  them.  In  Matthew,  the 
legendary  character  of  the  additions  is  particularly 
pronounced,  as  it  has  many  times  been  shown,  and  in 
Luke,  although  the  case  is  not  as  self-e\'ident,  the  same 
judgment  must  be  given.  The  dispute  about  prece- 
dence, which  Luke,  against  all  inherent  probability, 
assigns  to  the  last  supper,  the  other  Gospels  show  took 
place  on  the  occasion  of  the  request  of  James  and 
John.  Again,  the  saying  about  buying  a  sword  is 
disproven  by  the  accompanying  reference  to  the  dis- 
course on  the  sending  out  of  the  disciples,  which  we 
have  shown  that  Jesus  never  spoke.  The  different 
order  which  is  given  to  the  trial  scene,  is  shown  to  be 
a  displacement  of  the  older  account  on  which  Luke  is 

312 


The  Last  Days  of  yesus.  3 1 3 

drawing,  by  the  fact  that  the  maltreatment  of  Jesus  is 
made  to  come  before  his  condemnation,  while  in 
Matthew  and  Mark  the  condemnation  forms  its  obvious 
motive.  The  story  of  the  sending  to  Herod,  apart 
from  its  entire  absence  from  the  other  Gospels,  is  a 
manifest  interruption  of  what  in  the  older  account  is 
a  connected  and  straightforward  story  ;  the  elements 
of  which  it  is  composed,  the  silence  of  Jesus,  the  ac- 
cusations of  the  priests,  the  mockery  of  the  soldiers, 
are  just  the  elements  of  the  other  trial ;  the  expecta- 
tion of  seeing  a  miracle  is  unwarranted  if  Jesus  worked 
no  miracles  ;  and  the  pretext  which  Pilate  gives,  that 
Jesus  belonged  to  Herod's  jurisdiction,  makes  it  inex- 
plicable that  Herod  should  at  once  have  sent  him 
back  again.  Then  the  story  of  the  crucifixion  is  a 
confused,  and  at  times  blundering  reproduction  of 
Mark's  account,  and  the  additions  which  L,uke  does 
give  in  the  sayings  which  Jesus  is  recorded  to  have 
uttered,  it  is  impossible  to  defend,  for  they  either  have 
their  basis  in  the  Old  Testament,  or  else  in  themselves 
they  are  extremely  suspicious.  The  most  elaborate 
addition  is  the  incident  of  the  dying  thief ;  and  not 
only  is  this  a  late  story,  from  an  untrustworthy  source, 
which  contradicts,  too,  the  earlier  statement  that  both 
the  robbers  reviled  Jesus,  but  the  recognition  of  Jesus' 
Messiahship  just  when  he  was  the  very  farthest  from 
its  realization  in  the  popular  sense,  is  out  of  the  ques- 
tion, and,  in  any  case,  there  is  no  likelihood  that  any 
of  Jesus'  disciples  were  allowed  near  enough  to  him  to 
hear  a  conversation  of  such  a  sort.  And  finally,  the 
circumstantial  stories  about  the  appearances  of  the 
risen  Jesus,  are,  as  will  be  seen  in  the  next  chapter,  an 
absolute  impossibility. 

And  now,  after  we  have  disregarded  Matthew  and 


3 1 4      The  Life  and  Teachings  of  fcsus. 

lyuke,  there  still  remains  the  task  of  tracing  Mark's 
hand  in  what  is  left  behind,  and  then  again  the  task 
of  testing  rigorously  the  residue.  We  cannot  hope 
then  with  any  confidence  to  have  more  than  a  some- 
what meagre  array  of  facts  left  to  us  after  all  is  done. 
The  chronology  of  Jesus'  stay  in  Jerusalem,  which 
apparently  is  due  to  Mark,  and  which  makes  the  time 
a  week,  is  hardly  worthy  of  much  credence.  Whether 
we  ought  to  allow  a  longer  or  a  shorter  time  there  is 
not  much  use  in  asking,  although  the  statement  that 
Jesus  preached  by  daj^  in  the  Temple  and  went  out  in 
the  evening  to  lodge  in  the  Mount  of  Olives,  and  the 
statement  that  Judas  sought  from  that  time  an  oppor- 
tunity to  betray  him,  both  imply  that  the  older  narra- 
tive thought  of  the  period  as  at  least  of  some  little 
duration.  At  length,  however,  the  Passover  came,  and 
for  the  last  time  Jesus  sat  down  to  eat  with  his  disci- 
ples. 

Did  Jesus  know  that  the  end  was  so  near  at  hand  ?  It 
certainly  is  not  impossible  that  he  should  have  had 
some  intimation  of  it,  but  whether  he  did  or  no  must 
be  determined  by  examining  the  sayings  in  the  Gospels 
which  point  to  such  a  knowledge.  There  are  a  set 
of  these,  beginning  with  the  story  of  the  anointing 
at  Bethany.  This  story  is  a  beautiful  one,  and  taking 
it  alone  there  is  nothing  very  damaging  to  be  said 
against  it ;  but  for  critical  reasons  it  seems  necessary 
to  attribute  the  story  to  Mark,  It  comes  in  between 
two  sections  which  naturally  belong  together,  the  two 
statements  that  the  Pharisees  sought  means  to  put 
Jesus  to  death,  and  that  they  found  an  opportunity  of 
doing  this  through  Judas.  This  connection  the  story 
interrupts,  and  in  addition  it  betrays  its  origin  by  the 
vividness  of  its  style,   and  by   the  use  of  the  term 


The  Last  Days  of  Jesus.  3 1 5 

svayysXiov  in  a  way  which  seems  in  the  Gospels  to 
be  peculiar  to  Mark.  If  therefore  we  can  trace  the 
narrative  back  to  Mark,  it  would  be  rash  in  view  of 
Mark's  bad  reputation  to  allow  it  very  much  impor- 
tance ;  and  we  may  therefore  turn  to  the  other  passages, 
all  of  which  centre  about  the  supper  itself.  The  first 
of  these,  the  pointing  out  of  the  traitor,  has  the  least 
in  its  favor.  It  is  not  even  certain  whether  it  was 
present  in  the  source,  for  it  does  not  fit  with  perfect 
appropriateness  into  the  story  of  the  supper,  and  L,uke, 
by  deposing  it  from  its  position  at  the  beginning,  would 
rather  indicate  that  the  source  proceeded  directly  to 
an  account  of  the  Paschal  meal.  And  in  any  case  the 
natural  desire  which  tradition  would  feel  to  give  to 
Jesus  a  foreknowledge  of  the  traitor  must  constantlj^ 
be  kept  in  view.  Again  it  must  be  remembered  that 
the  question  is  not,  Is  there  anything  which  absolutely 
prevents  our  accepting  the  history  as  genuine  ?  When 
a  narrative  comes  to  us  in  company  with  so  very  much 
that  shows  the  work  of  legend,  the  fact  that  it  too  can 
easily  have  sprung  up  in  the  same  way  is  much  the 
same  as  saying  that  for  the  purposes  of  history  that  is 
the  explanation  we  are  bound  to  give  it.  Now,  here, 
as  has  been  said,  the  motive  for  the  incident  is  obvious, 
and  an  actual  foreknowledge  on  Jesus'  part  of  plans 
which  Judas  must  have  tried  very  hard  to  keep  a  secret, 
is  not  to  be  admitted  without  special  reason.  And 
when  we  add  to  this  that  the  language  to  Judas  is  based 
upon  the  Old  Testament,  and  that  Jesus,  in  a  way 
common  to  the  Church,  but  showing  a  mechanical  view 
of  prophecy  which  does  not  appear  in  the  authen- 
ticated sayings  of  Jesus  himself,  makes  his  death  come 
about  through  a  necessity  that  prophecy  should  be 
fulfilled,  and  apparently  bases  his  knowledge,  not  on 


3i6       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

information,  but  upon  this  fact  of  prophecy,  we  are 
obliged  to  reject  the  account.  Similarly  we  must 
decide  in  the  case  of  the  prophecy  of  Peter's  denial. 
That  Peter  did  deny  his  Lord  we  may  indeed  sup- 
pose to  be  an  actual  fact  ;  but  with  this  given  it  would 
be  a  very  simple  thing  for  tradition  to  dress  it  up  and 
give  to  it  dramatic  completeness,  and  in  pursuit  of  this 
to  put  a  forewarning  into  Jesus'  mouth.  It  happens 
that  we  have  two  versions  of  this  warning,  which 
indicates  the  amount  of  dependence  we  can  place  upon 
them  severally  ;  and  in  the  earlier  version  we  have  the 
same  use  of  prophecy  and  the  same  conception  of  it 
which  was  found  in  the  narrative  just  before.  When 
therefore  we  find  that  the  words  of  Jesus  are  peculiarly 
definite  and  show  an  improbable  knowledge  that  the 
blow  was  to  fall  that  very  night,  we  must  allow  that 
the  whole  is  very  doubtful. 

The  last  case  to  be  cited  has  decidedly  a  better  at- 
testation than  any  of  the  others,  and  it  leads  to  the 
somewhat  larger  question  as  to  the  facts  about  the  sup- 
per as  a  whole.  Here  we  may  take  leave  of  the  Gos- 
pels for  a  moment,  as  we  have  an  earlier  and  more 
reliable  account  in  the  letter  to  the  Corinthians.  Paul's 
account  runs  as  follows  :  ' '  For  I  received  of  the  Lord 
that  which  also  I  delivered  unto  you,  how  that  the 
Lord  Jesus  in  the  night  in  which  he  was  betrayed  took 
bread  ;  and  when  he  had  given  thanks,  he  broke  it, 
and  said,  This  is  my  body,  which  is  for  you  :  this  do 
in  remembrance  of  me.  In  like  manner  also  the  cup, 
after  supper,  saying,  This  cup  is  the  new  covenant  in 
my  blood  :  this  do,  as  oft  as  ye  drink  it,  in  remem- 
brance of  me."  It  will  be  noticed  that  the  Gospel  ver- 
sion adds  to  this  nothing  essential  except  the  words, 
' '  I  will  no  more  drink  of  the  fruit  of  the  vine,  until 


The  Last  Days  of  Jesus.  3 1 7 

that  day  when  I  drink  it  new  in  the  kingdom  of  God." 
Since  this  is  absent  from  Paul's  account,  and  since,  in 
addition,  it  most  naturally  indicates  a  conception  of 
the  kingdom  as  something  material,  or  apocalyptic,  at 
the  best,  we  may  dismiss  it  from  consideration.  But 
even  when  we  take  the  account  as  it  stands  in  Paul's 
letter,  there  is  no  little  difficulty  connected  with  it.  It 
is  hardly  possible  to  give  any  other  meaning  to  Jesus' 
words  than  that  he  looked  upon  his  death  as  a  sacrifice 
for  sin,  which  introduced  a  new  era  in  the  dealings  of 
God  with  men.  Now,  it  may  be  that  Jesus,  deeply 
impressed  with  the  thought  that  this  was  in  all  proba- 
bility his  last  Paschal  meal,  and  with  his  natural 
tendency  to  figure,  was  struck  by  the  resemblance  of 
his  own  approaching  death,  in  very  truth  a  sacrifice 
for  men,  to  the  old  sacrificial  rite  of  Jewish  worship, 
and  that  the  wine  and  broken  bread  came  to  him  as  an 
effective  way  to  give  an  object  lesson  to  his  followers, 
which  at  the  same  time  should  furnish  a  simple  bond 
of  union  for  the  new  spiritual  community.  This  cer- 
tainly is  not  inconceivable,  and  yet  after  all  one  ought 
not  to  blind  himself  to  the  fact  that  such  a  conception 
as  this  lies  decidedly  outside  the  realm  of  thought 
which  constituted  Jesus'  ordinary  mental  life.  There 
is  nothing  to  correspond  to  it  in  what  we  have  dis- 
covered of  Jesus'  teaching,  for  the  saying  in  Mark, 
' '  The  Son  of  man  came  to  give  his  life  a  ransom  for 
many,"  drops  away  when  we  retain  the  subsequent 
sentence  about  the  twelve  thrones,  as  is  done  by  Luke,' 
and  is  shown  to  be  a  dogmatic  paraphrase  of  Jesus' 
words.  Now  there  is  nothing  which  has  come  out 
more  clearly  in  our  survey  of  Jesus'  teaching  than  the 
manner  in  which  he  clears  away  all  the  artificialities 
'  See  Luke  22  :  27. 


3 1 8       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  fesus. 

which  had  grown  up  about  the  relations  between  God 
and  men,  and  gets  right  down  to  the  simple  and  uni- 
versal principles  on  which  the  religious  life  is  built.  It 
is  just  for  this  reason  that  Jesus'  words  appeal  so 
powerfully  to  the  modern  consciousness,  because  they 
come  to  us  so  largely  unrefracted  by  the  medium  of 
Jewish  technical  terminology  and  theological  concep- 
tions. Paul  also  got  out  into  the  light  after  a  good 
deal  of  trouble  about  it,  but  it  was  by  an  entirely  dif- 
ferent path.  To  Paul  the  old  artificial  barriers  between 
God  and  men,  the  legalities  of  an  external  covenant, 
and  the  complicated  relationship  to  an  external  law, 
still  had  all  their  force  ;  and  in  order  to  get  himself 
out  of  the  meshes  of  a  partial  and  mechanical  Judaism, 
with  which  his  profound  religious  feeling  would  not 
let  him  rest  content,  he  had  to  construct  an  intricate 
sj'stem,  in  which  the  old  legalism  was  beaten  on  its 
own  ground,  in  which  with  all  a  lawyer's  subtilty  God 
was  relieved  from  the  technical  difficulties  in  which  he 
had  got  himself  involved,  and  his  love  and  care  for 
men  allow^ed  free  course.  Jesus  needed  nothing  of 
this,  simply  because  his  mind  had  been  able  to  slip  the 
artificial  restraints  which  caused  all  the  difficulty  in  the 
first  place,  by  means  of  the  discovery  that  God  did  not 
stand  to  men  in  the  relation  of  magistrate  and  custo- 
dian of  a  law  outside  himself,  but  rather  of  a  Father, 
that  love  on  God's  part,  never  restricted  or  pent  up  by 
mechanical  devises  or  contracts,  and  on  the  part  of 
man  repentance  and  loving  obedience  which  the  Father 
was  only  too  ready  to  meet  more  than  half-w^ay,  left  no 
room  for  the  problems  of  theology  which  aim  to  do 
away  with  conditions  which  never  existed.  But  while 
these  words  move  in  a  different  realm  of  thought  from 
that  in  which  Jesus  lived,  we  also  ought  to  notice  that 


The  Last  Days  of  yesus.  319 

they  exactly  chime  in  with  the  circle  of  ideas  in  which 
Paul  was  more  especially  interested.  To  Paul  the 
sacrificial  aspects  of  Christ's  death  were  a  matter  of  a 
great  deal  of  importance,  and  the  "  new  covenant  "  is 
essentially  a  Pauline  formula,  about  which  his  theology 
largely  centred. 

This  therefore  must  be  borne  in  mind  while  we  turn 
aside  to  notice  a  peculiar  feature  in  Paul's  account. 
This  is  the  way  in  which  Paul  speaks  of  his  informa- 
tion as  something  which  he  had  received  from  the 
lyord.  Now  there  is  the  possibility,  which  we  admit, 
that  Paul  means  nothing  more  by  this  than  that  it  is 
to  the  Lord  that  the  institution  of  the  supper  originally 
goes  back  ;  and  yet  if  this  is  what  he  means  he  cer- 
tainly has  chosen  a  very  ambiguous  way  of  saying  it. 
If  Paul  had  wished  merely  to  say  that  he  was  about  to 
give  them  Jesus'  words,  there  was  an  easy  way  for 
him  to  say  it ;  whereas  the  form  of  statement  which  he 
does  use,  the  stress  that  is  put  upon  himself  as  the 
recipient  and  upon  the  Lord  as  the  source  of  informa- 
tion, inevitably  gives  the  impression  that  he  is  speak- 
ing of  something  made  known  directly  to  himself. 
When  in  another  place  he  gives  a  piece  of  history,  the 
story  of  the  resurrection,  he  talks  about  it  in  the  way 
we  should  expect  him  to,  while  if  he  wishes  to  empha- 
size his  entire  independence  of  a  human  medium,  as 
in  the  case  of  the  principles  of  his  Gospel,  he  speaks 
in  the  same  fashion  of  receiving  his  knowledge  straight 
from  God  and  not  from  man.  It  must  be  noticed,  too, 
that  Paul  does  not  say  he  received  from  the  Lord  the 
command  to  observe  the  rite,  unless  he  is  using  lan- 
guage very  loosely,  but  rather  it  is  the  fact  that  Jesus 
uttered  these  words  which  he  received.  Now  of  course 
we  cannot  admit  that  Paul  actually  got  the  information 


320       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  Jesus, 

in  a  miraculous  way  ;  a  miracle  to  save  the  trouble  of 
asking  some  one  for  himself  is  least  of  all  conceivable  : 
and  so  we  are  led  to  ask  if  there  is  not  some  other 
explanation  available,  before  giving  up  the  natural 
meaning  of  the  words. 

Now  if  we  put  together  the  two  facts,  that  the  say- 
ing attributed  to  Jesus  is  redolent  of  Pauline  theology 
and  extremel}'  difiicult  to  fit  in  with  Jesus'  conceptions, 
and  that  Paul  himself  apparently  tells  us  that  he  got 
the  saying  b)^  direct  and  supernatural  means,  we  are 
already  pointed  in  the  direction  we  shall  have  to  follow. 
The  last  paschal  meal  of  Jesus  with  his  disciples,  when 
his  life  was  so  soon  to  go  out  in  the  tragedy  of  cruci- 
fixion, must  have  been  a  subject  of  never-failing  attrac- 
tiveness for  religious  meditation.  Paul  had  come  to  his 
doctrine  of  the  sacrificial  nature  of  Christ's  death,  and 
now  how  tempting  it  would  be  to  find  an  intimation 
of  this  in  what  was  almost  the  last  word  of  Jesus  ; 
indeed,  if  the  doctrine  was  a  true  one,  as  Paul  had  no 
manner  of  doubt,  how  could  Jesus  possibly  have 
avoided  such  a  reference.  There  was  to  go  upon  the 
fact  that  Jesus  had  taken  bread  and  offered  it  to  his 
disciples,  and  likewise  the  wine  after  supper  :  what 
were  the  bread  and  wine  but  emblems  of  the  broken 
body  and  the  blood  of  the  new  covenant  ?  And  with 
the  conviction  that  such  was  the  fact  once  firmly 
rooted,  the  step  is  not  a  very  long  one  to  the  belief  that 
Jesus  really  had  made  the  explanation,  particularly  if 
we  may  suppose  that  a  vision  sealed  it  to  him. 

Now  this  hypothesis  is  not  an  arbitrarj''  attempt  to 
overthrow  Paul's  testimony,  but  it  is  an  effort  to  get 
rid  of  two  real  difficulties.  Of  course  there  are  diffi- 
culties also  that  can  be  raised  against  the  hypothesis 
itself ;  to  these   however  answers  can  be  given.     To 


The  Last  Days  of  jfesus.  32 1 

say  that  Paul  never  could  have  worked  himself  into 
such  a  conviction  is  a  very  large  assumption,  when  we 
consider  how  foreign  modern  caution  was  to  the  times 
in  which  he  lived.  It  is  a  fault  of  conservative  criti- 
cism, that  it  argues  too  much  upon  what  men  are 
likely  to  do  when  actuated  by  pure  and  enlightened 
reason,  and  refuses  to  take  into  account  the  plain  fact 
that  men's  minds  often  do  not  work  along  these  lines, 
but  are  subject  to  vagaries  of  every  sort.  When  dog- 
matic conclusions  are  held  as  truth  unassailable,  then 
facts  of  history,  as  might  be  shown  even  by  modern 
examples,  must  accommodate  themselves  to  dogmas, 
or  it  goes  hard  with  them ;  and  moreover  such  a 
growth  of  dogma  into  history  the  whole  phenomenon 
of  the  Gospels  compels  us  constantly  to  assume.  It 
also  may  be  objected  that  the  report  must  inevitably 
have  been  corrected  by  the  older  Apostles.  But  this 
loses  sight  of  the  fact  that  Paul  seldom  came  in  contact 
with  the  Apostles,  who  confined  themselves  pretty 
closely  to  their  own  field  of  work,  and.  that  when  he 
did  meet  them  it  was  to  settle  some  all-absorbing  ques- 
tion. Another  objection  may  lie  in  the  supposed  im- 
possibility that  a  rite  which  did  not  actually  have 
Jesus'  sanction  back  of  it  should  j^et  have  become  uni- 
versally adopted  by  the  Church.  But  Paul's  authority 
was  certainly  sufficient  for  Gentile  Christianity,  which 
was  the  dominant  influence  in  the  catholic  Church, 
and  of  the  early  history  of  the  rite  in  the  primitive 
Apostolic  church  we  have  practically  no  definite  knowl- 
edge. Moreover  it  may  be  argued  that  the  institution, 
when  first  it  meets  us,  is  by  no  means  what  we  should 
expect  a  memorial  rite  to  be.  The  very  name  by  which 
the  meeting  went  at  which  it  is  supposed  that  it  was 
celebrated,   and    which   from    Paul's   account    would 


322       The  Life  and  Teachings  of  yesus. 

seem  to  be  identical  with  it,  the  agape,  points  to  a  dif- 
ferent origin.  It  seems  to  have  been  a  common  social 
gathering  of  the  Church,  and  this  characteristic  hardly 
could  have  assumed  the  prominence  it  did,  so  as  to 
supply  the  name  of  the  gathering,  if  the  rite  had  been 
definitely  instituted  by  Jesus  himself  for  another  pur- 
pose. And  then  again  a  memorial  rite  naturally  would 
be  celebrated  once  a  year,  on  the  anniversary  of  the 
event  it  commemorated,  or  at  any  rate  it  would  be  cele- 
brated at  certain  definite  times. 

Before  dropping  the  matter  however  it  may  be 
allowable  to  hazard  one  more  conjecture.  The  fact 
that  it  was  the  love-feast  which  grew  into  the  Lord's 
Supper  suggests  that  perhaps  after  all  some  special 
character  had  already  been  attached  to  it  which  made 
the  transition  a  natural  and  an  easy  one.  Moreover, 
while  the  discovery  of  a  dogmatic  significance  in  Jesus' 
act,  and  the  conclusion  from  this  that  Jesus  must  have 
seen  it  and  indicated  it,  is  no  xoxy  violent  assumption 
when  the  premises  that  governed  Paul's  reasoning  are 
taken  into  account,  yet  there  is  no  such  obvious 
dogmatic  basis  for  the  command,  ' '  Do  this  in  remem- 
brance of  me  "  ;  and  if  we  could  regard  this  command 
as  really  issuing  from  Jesus,  the  arbitrariness  of  Paul's 
addition  would  be  very  much  lessened.  What  there- 
fore do  these  words  refer  to  in  Paul's  account?  What 
w^as  it  that  Jesus  commanded  to  be  done  ?  They  cannot 
mean,  Repeat  this  formula,  as  modern  churches  do, 
for  of  this  there  is  not  the  least  hint  in  the  narrative. 
Neither  can  they  very  well  mean,  Celebrate  this  rite. 
To  the  disciples  the  supper  simply  was  the  Passover 
meal,  and  if  Jesus  had  wished  to  command  them  to 
celebrate,   after  his  death,   which  they  did  not  know 


The  Last  Days  of  Jesus.  323 

was  so  imminent,  another  supper,  with  an  entirely  dif- 
ferent motive  and  in  an  entirely  different  way,  he  would 
have  needed  to  go  much  more  into  detail  than  he  does. 
Besides  this,  such  a  command  would  have  been  given 
only  once,  referring  to  the  rite  as  a  whole,  whereas,  by 
repeating  it  in  connection  both  with  the  bread  and  the 
wine,  Jesus  indicates  that  he  means  something,  not 
including  both,  but  connected  with  each.  And  when, 
the  second  time,  he  gives  the  command  before  the  cup 
is  passed,  he  hardly  can  be  guilty  of  the  tautology, 
Drink  this  wine,  as  often  as  ye  drink  it,  or.  Celebrate 
this  rite,  as  often  as  by  drinking  the  wine  ye  celebrate 
it  ;  the  added  clause,  "  as  often  as  ye  drink,"  makes  it 
improbable  that  the  words  should  be  meant  as  the 
institution  of  a  rite. 

The  only  other  suggestion  which  occurs  to  us  as 
natural  is  the  very  simple  suggestion  that  Jesus  just 
means  this  :  Do  what  I  have  just  now  done  ;  and  the 
only  thing  he  is  recorded  to  have  done  is  to  have  given 
thanks.  And  this  at  once  would  explain  the  fact  that 
the  words  are  repeated  both  before  the  bread  and  wine, 
and  most  of  all  it  would  explain  Jesus'  words  in  the 
latter  case:  "Do  this,"  says  Jesus,  ''as  often  as  ye 
drink.'''  And  does  it  not  strike  one  too  as  eminently 
natural,  and  as  just  what  we  might  expect  of  Jesus? 
He  wishes  some  simple  token  to  bring  him  to  their 
minds,  and  what  more  appropriate  than  this,  whereby 
each  day,  and  constantly  throughout  the  day,  the 
grateful  recognition  of  God's  mercies  should  be  the 
spell  to  call  up  the  thought  of  him  who  taught  them 
to  say  "  Our  Father."  Easily  the  recollection  of  this 
simple  memorial  might  become  especially  attached  to 
those  meals  where  all  the  band  of  Christians  met  in 


324        The  Life  and  Teachings  of  fesus. 

common,  just  as  here  Jesus  had  been  seated  with  his 
disciples  ;  and  then  Paul's  discovery  of  the  sacramental 
nature  of  the  act  would  form  the  transition  point 
through  which  the  love-feast  came  gradually  to  be  the 
solenni  rite  of  the  Lord's  Supper. 

We  shall  not  attempt  to  criticise  in  detail  the  rest  of 
the  Gospel  narrative.  The  story  undoubtedly  has  got 
its  coloring  in  a  very  decided  degree  from  the  Old 
Testament,  and  in  some  places,  as  in  the  account  of 
the  crucifixion,  is  taken  almost  bodily  from  that  source. 
What  appears  with  certainty  is  that  Jesus  was  arrested 
privately  and  condemned  by  the  Sanhedrin,  and  that 
sufficient  influence  was  brought  to  bear  upon  the 
procurator  to  secure  his  execution,  most  likely  on  the 
charge  of  treason  to  the  Roman  power.  Probably  a 
few  other  facts  may  also  be  established  with  greater  or 
less  confidence,  but  the}^  are  not  certain  enough  to 
build  very  much  upon.  Already  we  have  before  us  the 
most  that  we  can  hope  to  know  about  the  external 
aspect  of  Jesus'  life.  How  that  life  in  its  apparent  de- 
feat and  extinction  yet  went  on  to  change  so  mightily 
the  course  of  all  human  history,  belongs  to  the  story 
of  the  Church.  To-day  its  power  is  at  work  more 
mightily  than  ever  before,  and  in  a  new  and  truer  way. 
His  own  disciples  never  fullj^  understood  Jesus,  and  in 
the  Church  his  features  grew  so  indistinct  and  unearthly 
that  only  the  greatness  of  his  personality,  which  once 
perceived,  never  could  be  quite  forgotten,  caused  that 
they  should  not  be  altogether  lost  to  sight.  To-day  it 
is  our  task  to  dispel  the  misty  clouds  of  incense  about 
his  head,  which  hide  while  the}^  fain  would  do  him 
honor,  and  let  the  world  look  full  upon  his  face.  The 
hope  for  the  Church  is  that  she  has  set  herself  to  do 


The  Last  Days  of  yesus. 


325 


this  task,  and  already  the  effects  are  beginning  to  ap- 
pear. Every  effort  to  do  this,  partial  though  it  may 
be,  deserves  the  fullest  welcome  ;  every  attempt  to 
hinder  it  must  inevitably  fail.  If  one  has  confidence 
in  truth,  he  cannot  fear  the  issue. 


CHAPTER   IX. 


THE    RESURRECTION   OF  JESUS. 


AND  SO  with  the  death  on  the  cross  Jesus'  life-work 
closed,  and  for  the  moment,  with  all  its  magnifi- 
cent promise  and  heroic  struggle,  defeat  seemed 
all  that  had  come  of  it  at  last.  How  after  that  short  in- 
terval of  darkness  light  began  again  to  break,  how  the 
idea  of  Jesus  gradually  and  in  the  midst  of  stupidities 
and  conventionalities  and  misunderstandings  without 
number  finally  began  to  show  what  power  and  intense  life 
was  wrapped  up  in  it,  belongs,  as  we  have  said,  rather 
to  the  history  of  the  Christian  Church.  But  there  is 
one  factor  in  this  great  result,  the  belief  in  Jesus' 
Resurrection,  which  is  bound  up  so  closely  with  Jesus' 
life  that  some  slight  discussion  of  it  can  hardly  be 
avoided  even  if  it  leads  just  a  little  out  of  the  way. 
Besides  it  is  a  difficult  question,  as  we  admit,  and  we  do 
not  want  to  have  it  appear  that  we  would  wish  to 
shirk  it.  When,  however,  we  say  that  the  question  is 
not  an  easy  one,  we  do  not  mean  to  have  it  understood 
that  a  particularly  strong  case  can  be  made  out  for  the 
story  of  Jesus'  bodily  Resurrection  as  the  Gospels 
understand  it.  This  indeed  is  far  from  being  true  ; 
the  evidence  for  the  Resurrection  as  the  Gospels  speak 
of  it  is  very  weak,  weaker  upon  the  whole  than  the 

326 


The  Resurrection  of  Jesus.  327 

evidence  for  most  of  the  other  miracles  in  the  Gos- 
pels. It  is  not  necessary  to  dwell  again  upon  the 
inconsistencies  of  the  Gospel  stories,  but  one 
surely  cannot  help  seeing  that  many  inconsist- 
encies there  are.  According  to  one  account  the 
Resurrection  took  place  at  the  end  of  the  Sabbath, 
according  to  others  on  the  first  day  of  the  week.  Jesus 
appears  first,  now  to  Mary  Magdalene  alone,  now  to  a 
number  of  women,  now  to  Peter.  In  one  Gospel  the 
Apostles  do  not  leave  Jerusalem,  in  another  the  only 
appearance  is  in  Galilee.  The  farewell  words  of  Jesus 
do  not  agree.  The  ascension  is  now  from  the  Mount 
of  Olives,  now  from  a  mountain  in  Galilee.  The 
appearances  which  are  found  in  one  Gospel  are  not 
found  in  another,  and  Paul,  who  professes  to  give  an 
accurate  list  of  them,  excludes  one  half  of  the  appear- 
ances which  the  Gospels  give.  Now  we  do  not  insist 
so  much  upon  the  fact  that  there  are  inconsistencies, 
as  upon  the  fact  that  these  inconsistencies  should 
occur  just  here.  There  is  no  other  part  of  the  Gospels 
where  the  narratives  are  so  impossible  to  reconcile,  and 
yet  this  is  just  the  place  where  we  should  suppose  they 
would  have  been  most  exact.  It  was  upon  the  Resur- 
rection that  the  Apostles  based  their  preaching,  they 
constantly  were  making  their  appeal  to  it ;  well,  then, 
we  ask,  why  was  there  not  here  a  definite  statement 
of  fact  upon  which  tradition  could  draw  ?  why  do 
the  Evangelists  here  seem  to  be  left  entirely  to  their 
own  resources,  and  their  narratives  to  assume  more 
distinctly  the  appearance  of  legend  ?  why  do  the 
Apostles  appeal  simply  to  the  fact  of  the  Resurrection 
and  not  to  its  special  features  ?  how  does  it  happen 
that  it  is  only  in  the  latest  strata  of  our  Gospels,  in  our 
present  Matthew  and  lytike,  that  we  find  the  definite 


328       The  Life  and  Teaclmigs  of  Jesus. 

features  at  all,  and  that  even  Mark  had  to  stop  with  the 
appearance  of  the  angels  at  the  tomb  ?  It  may  be  that 
there  are  other  good  reasons  for  this,  but  we  think  by 
far  the  best  reason  is,  that  nothing  more  was  told 
about  the  Resurrection  because,  in  a  word,  there  was 
nothing  to  tell,  because  the  appearances  were  appear- 
ances only,  with  no  external  features  to  them,  and 
because  it  was  only  when  tradition  had  been  given 
time  to  work  that  anything  more  could  be  told. 

And  then,  while  we  are  finding  diflficulties,  one  must 
we  think  admit  that  the  Resurrection  is  peculiarly 
hard  to  accept,  not  perhaps  because  it  is  a  miracle  so 
much  as  because  it  is  unimaginable  :  that  a  thing 
is  unimaginable  is  surely,  miracle  or  no  miracle,  no 
mean  argument  against  it.  What,  w^e  have  to  ask, 
was  the  nature  of  the  body  in  which  Jesus  rose  ?  was 
it  still  a  material  body  ?  this  certainly  is  what  we 
should  gather  from  the  accounts.  It  is  the  same  body 
which  only  a  day  before  was  buried,  and  a  miracle  by 
which  matter  has  been  changed  of  a  sudden  into  spirit 
is  at  all  events  a  little  startling.  And  the  Evangelists 
scarcely  leave  us  in  any  doubt  about  this :  Jesus 
speaks  with  a  human  voice,  he  is  seen  with  the  ej'e,  he 
eats  material  food,  he  can  be  touched  and  handled, 
the  wounds  still  are  in  his  hands  and  side,  "  a  spirit," 
he  says,  ' '  has  not  flesh  and  bones  as  ye  see  me  have. ' ' 
We  do  not  intend  to  argue  against  the  Resurrection  in 
this  sense,  the  raising  up  of  the  material  body  ;  those 
who  can  hold  to  this  belief  we  have  no  desire  to  dis- 
turb. But  those  who  onl}'  can  look  upon  the  Resur- 
rection as  something,  not  material,  but  spiritual,  we  ask 
how  they  are  to  reconcile  with  this  the  Resurrection  of 
Jesus  which  the  Gospels  speak  of  And  we  do  not 
lose  sight   of  the   fact   that  there   are  other  features 


The  Resurrection  of  Jesus.  329 

which  point  in  a  different  direction,  which  seem  to 
imply  a  body  which  was  not  material  after  all.  Jesus 
passes  through  closed  doors,  he  vanishes  in  an  instant, 
he  appears  in  different  forms,  he  ascends  into  the 
clouds  :  these  things,  say  the  commentators,  all  show  a 
spiritual  body.  If  these  qualities  went  by  themselves 
we  should  have  but  little  to  say  ;  but  the  fact  that  they 
are  qualities  which  are  superadded  to  a  material  body, 
this  is  what  makes  the  whole  thing  most  inconceivable. 
How  are  we  to  think  of  a  body  which  can  be  touched 
and  still  can  pass  through  wood  ?  a  body  that  can 
digest  food  and  yet  vanish  in  a  moment  ?  How  can  we 
help  seeing  that  here  we  are  in  the  realm  of  magic,  of 
fairy-land,  where  contradictions  are  overlooked,  and 
where  everything  is  possible?  It  is  just  because  the 
doctrine  of  the  Apostles  is  something  very  different 
from  this  that  it  is  not  to  be  rejected  without  hesitation. 
And  that  the  doctrine  of  the  Apostles  was  not  at  all 
like  this  is  proven  by  the  testimony  of  Paul,  the  only 
testimony  that  w^e  have  which  is  beyond  suspicion,  so 
that  upon  it  our  whole  conception  of  the  Resurrection 
must  depend.  In  his  letter  to  the  Corinthians,  he  has 
occasion  to  recall  to  them  the  evidence  upon  which 
their  faith  is  based,  and  he  does  this  very  carefully  and 
circumstantially.  "For  I  delivered  unto  you  first  of 
all  that  which  also  I  received,  how  that  Christ  died 
for  our  sins  according  to  the  Scriptures  ;  and  that  he 
was  buried  ;  and  that  he  hath  been  raised  on  the  third 
day  according  to  the  Scriptures  ;  and  that  he  appeared 
to  Cephas  ;  then  to  the  Twelve  ;  then  he  appeared  to 
above  five  hundred  brethren  at  once,  of  whom  the 
greater  part  remain  until  now,  but  some  are  fallen 
asleep  ;  then  he  appeared  to  James  ;  then  to  all  the 
Apostles  ;  and  last  of  all,  as  unto  one  born  out  of  due 


330       The  Life  and  Teachitigs  of  fesus. 


time,  he  appeared  tome  also."  We  notice  here  that 
Paul  speaks  only  of  an  appearance  ;  he  does  not  speak 
of  long  interviews,  he  does  not  tell  how  Jesus  walked 
and  talked  with  his  disciples  and  what  commands  he 
gave  them  ;  he  gives  no  hint  of  all  this.  And  when 
we  remember  that  Paul  is  giving  here  the  strongest  evi- 
dence that  he  can  of  the  Resurrection,  we  say  again 
that  the  only  natural  reason  why  he  did  not  give  details 
is  that  there  were  no  details  to  give,  that  the  appear- 
ances were  momentar}'  visions,  and  nothing  more. 
And  Paul  shows  this  clearl}'  when  he  classes  his  own 
vision  with  those  of  the  Apostles,  and  makes  no  differ- 
ence between  them.  For  in  the  case  of  Paul  there  can 
be  no  doubt  that  we  have  a  vision  of  the  glorified 
Christ,  not  at  all  any  seeing  with  the  bodily  eyes  ;  and 
surely  if  the  other  Apostles  had  seen  Jesus  on  earth  as 
an  ordinary  man,  who  had  walked  and  talked  with 
them,  Paul  never  could  have  put  his  experience  along 
with  theirs,  for  the  two  are  quite  distinct.  So  that 
without  hesitation  we  sa}^  that  the  fact  of  the  Resur- 
rection w^as  a  series  of  visions,  of  momentarj^  appear- 
ances of  the  risen  Christ,  which  were  not  visible  to  the 
bodily  eye ;  and  the  only  question  is  whether  we  can 
explain  these  appearances  in  a  purelj'  natural  way. 

We  think  that  certainl}'  there  is  much  to  be  said  in 
favor  of  a  natural  explanation.  Jesus  had  exercised 
such  an  influence  over  the  minds  of  his  disciples,  that 
even  his  death  is  not  likely  wholly  to  have  shaken 
their  faith  in  him,  and  gradually  they  would  have 
tried  to  reconcile  his  death  wdth  their  earlier  con- 
ceptions. And  this  thej^  actuall}'  did  in  some  way  or 
other  succeed  in  doing  ;  they  found  Jesus'  sufferings 
in  the  Scriptures,  and  with  this  discover}^  their  confi- 
dence may  well  have  returned  in  some  measure.     With 


TJie  Resurrection  of  fesiis.  331 

the  thought  of  Jesus'  death  as  a  sacrifice  they  easily 
could  conceive  of  him  as  throned  in  heaven,  only  wait- 
ing to  come  again  in  order  to  complete  his  mission. 
And  when  this  point  was  reached,  in  a  moment  of 
excitement,  one  of  the  disciples  may  have  had  a  vision 
of  the  glorified  Jesus  ;  and  then  it  would  have  spread  to 
others,  srb  that  even  a  number  of  persons  at  the  same 
time,  in  highly  wrought  expectation,  might  think  that 
they  had  seen  it.  Now  what  gives  this  theory  its  force 
is  the  fact  that  it  does  correspond  to  conditions  which 
are  to  be  found  in  the  early  Christian  times.  Such 
phenomena  as  these,  visions  and  ecstasies,  we  know 
were  frequent,  and  it  was  believed  that  they  were 
divinely  produced.  One  of  the  very  witnesses  to  the 
Resurrection,  the  Apostle  Paul,  had  this  power,  the 
power  of  seeing  visions,  which,  in  other  cases  at  least, 
we  must  refer  to  natural  causes.  We  cannot  think  of 
the  Apostles  as  cautious  and  skeptical,  ready  to  weigh 
and  to  scrutinize  the  supernatural,  as  it  was  just  in 
these  qualities  that  they  were  most  signally  lacking. 
If  we  can  trust  the  account  in  Acts,  the  beginning  of 
the  Church  was  especiall}'  marked  by  these  ecstatic 
outbreaks,  and  we  need  onl)^  recall  the  gift  of  tongues, 
a  gift  that  was  looked  at  by  ever}^  one,  even  by  Paul,  as 
divinely  produced.  That  all  these  phenomena  were 
really  miraculous  we  scarcely  can  believe,  because  we 
find  what  is  analogous  to  them  in  all  times  of  great 
religious  excitement ;  so  that  we  must  hesitate  before  we 
explain  the  appearances  of  Jesus  in  any  different  way. 

Nor  do  we  think  that  the  point  which  has  been  so 
vigorously  pressed,  the  disappearance  of  Jesus'  body, 
is  any  objection  to  this  theory  ;  it  only  becomes  diffi- 
cult when  we  refuse  to  see  that  there  are  legendarj^ 
elements  in  the  Gospels.     We  learn  from  the  Gospels 


332       The  Life  and  Tcac Jungs  of  Jesus. 

that  after  the  Sabbath  the  women  found  the  tomb 
empty,  while  a  vision  of  angels  made  known  to  them 
that  Jesus  had  risen.  But  the  whole  of  this  story  is 
decidedly  suspicious  ;  to  begin  with,  there  is  the  vision 
of  angels,  and  this  at  least  cannot  be  history.  And  if 
we  drop  this  vision  then  the  whole  motive  for  the  story 
is  gone  ;  to  say  nothing  of  the  fact  that  the  purpose 
which  brings  the  women  to  the  tomb,  the  anointing  of 
a  body  which  already  has  been  buried,  is  utterly  op- 
posed to  Jewish  custom.  And  along  with  this  is  the  fact 
that  the  disciples,  in  all  likelihood,  had  fled  at  once  to 
Galilee  to  escape  the  fate  of  their  Master.  It  only  is  in 
the  latest  accounts  that  Jesus  appears  in  Jerusalem, 
and  we  can  see  how  this  would  be  the  tendency  of  tra- 
dition, to  centre  everything  about  the  capital.  But  in 
the  older  accounts  it  is  in  Galilee  that  Jesus  shows  him- 
self; the  appearance  to  five  hundred  disciples  which 
Paul  speaks  of  could  have  taken  place  in  Galilee  and  in 
Galilee  only  ;  the  angels  expressly  send  word  through 
the  women  that  he  will  meet  the  disciples  in  Galilee, 
and  this  loses  all  of  its  significance  if  there  was  a  prior 
meeting  in  the  city.  We  have  no  indication  either  as 
to  how  long  it  was  before  the  visions  took  place,  for 
the  forty  days  which  lyuke  speaks  of  clearly  has  no 
historical  value  ;  and  when  the  visions  did  take  place, 
questions  about  Jesus'  body  must  have  been  of  infi- 
nitely little  importance.  It  never  could  have  occurred 
to  the  disciples  that  the  Resurrection  needed  any  such 
proof  as  this.  Doubtless  they  assumed  that  the  grave 
was  empty,  but  even  if  we  could  conceive  that  they 
should  think  it  necessary  to  make  an  examination,  yet 
they  were  in  Galilee,  and  already  so  long  a  time  may 
have  passed  since  the  burial  that  examination  would 
be  useless. 


The  Resurrection  of  Jestis.  333 

At  the  same  time  we  will  not  deny  that  after  all  has 
been  said  the  difficulties  in  the  way  of  this  theory  are 
still  sufficiently  great,  and  we  do  not  feel  that  it  is  to 
be  accepted  unhesitatingly.  In  the  first  place  a  con- 
dition of  mind  which  could  produce  a  vision  is  not 
likely  to  have  arisen  at  once  after  Jesus'  death.  True, 
the  despondency  of  the  disciples  has  we  think  often 
been  much  exaggerated.  If  Jesus  had  prepared  the 
disciples  for  his  death,  as  it  seems  probable  that  he  had 
done,  and  if  in  words  which  they  still  remembered  he 
had  assumed  that  they  were  to  carry  on  his  work,  then 
they  could  not  have  been  utterly  cast  down  when  the 
crisis  came  ;  and  the  fact  that  as  many  as  five  hundred 
of  them  still  recognized  themselves  as  Jesus'  disciples, 
and  could  on  occasion  be  gathered  together,  is  proof 
that  this  was  not  so.  But  still  the  shock  must  have 
been  a  severe  one,  and  they  could  not  all  at  once  have 
recovered  from  it ;  they  had  now  to  go  to  work  under 
conditions  which  certainly  tended  to  sober  their  imag-  ^ 

inations,  and  we  do  not  see  that  there  was  much  in  / 

their    situation    to    call    forth     these    extravagances.  ; 

Now  we  do  not  know  how  long  it  was  before  the 
visions  appeared,  and  yet  we  hardly  can  allow  a  very 
great  interval  of  time.  The  Apostles  placed  the  Resur- 
rection on  the  third  day,  and  this  is  not  difficult  to 
account  for;  as  Paul  says,  it  was  "according  to  the 
Scriptures."  But  while  this  does  not  fix  the  time  of 
Christ's  appearing,  yet  it  is  natural  to  think  that  this 
bore  some  reasonable  relation  to  the  time  which  the 
Apostles  fixed  upon  for  the  Resurrection,  and  it  agrees 
with  this  that  Paul  separates  his  own  vision  sharply 
from  those  of  the  other  Apostles,  and  implies  that  there 
was  a  long  interval  of  time  between  them. 

Moreover  we  do  not  think  it  is  altogether  in  favor  of 


334        ^^^  Zz/^  and  Teachings  of  Jesus. 

the  vision  theory  that  it  is-  in  general  only  to  the  Apos- 
tles that  the  visions  come  ;  on  the  whole  we  think  that 
naturally  these  would  have  been  the  last  to  be  affected 
by  the  delusion,  and  that  it  would  have  been  more 
likely  to  appear  among  the  less  distinguished  followers 
of  Jesus.  The  Apostles  were  men  who  especially  had 
been  picked  out  by  Jesus,  and  for  some  time  they  had 
been  living  under  his  direct  influence,  an  influence 
that  was  eminently  sane  and  heathful ;  moreover  the 
work  which  they  afterwards  accomplished  shows  that 
Jesus  had  not  been  altogether  mistaken  in  them.  But 
to  think  that  just  these  men,  not  one  or  two  of  them 
alone,  but  all  of  them  together,  should  twice  have  been 
deceived  by  a  heated  imagination  into  the  belief  that 
Jesus  had  appeared  to  them,  is  not  without  its  diffi- 
cult5^  And  we  also  should  take  into  account  the  cer- 
tainty which  they  felt  that  this  appearance  was  real, 
and  the  immense  consequences  which  resulted  from  the 
conviction.  And  most  of  all  is  it  difficult  to  explain 
the  limited  number  of  the  appearances ;  the  course  of 
events  seems  to  have  been  just  what  in  the  case  of  a 
religious  excitement  we  should  not  have  expected  it  to 
be,  and  the  whole  thing  suddenly  stops  when  it  has 
reached  its  greatest  intensit\\  How  such  a  delusion 
might  spring  up  it  is  easy  to  explain  ;  but  when  it 
once  had  got  under  way  its  whole  tendency  would  be 
to  spread,  to  assume  wider  and  wider  proportions. 
Here  we  have  all  the  conditions,  we  have  five  hundred 
people  so  wrought  upon  that  they  fancy  they  have  seen 
a  vision  ;  and  yet  so  far  as  Paul  seems  able  to  tell,  this 
appearance,  outside  the  Apostolic  circle,  is  the  first  and 
the  last  one. 

If  one  thinks  that  these  arguments  are  not  to  be  set 
aside,  there  still  is  left  open  to  him  the  possibility  of  a 


The  Resurrection  of  Jesus.  335 

real  influence  of  Jesus  upon  his  disciples,  a  revelation 
of  his  continued  existence,  though  a  revelation  purely 
psychical.  We  cannot  at  present  deny  the  possibility 
of  such  an  influence  ;  the  evidence  which  in  other 
cases  points  to  its  possibility  is  certainly  extremely 
dubious,  and  yet  even  there  it  is  not  absolutely  without 
force.  So  long  as  any  other  explanation  is  sufficient 
we  cannot  resort  to  this  ;  for  our  part  however  we  are 
not  ready  to  insist  that  other  explanations  are  entirely 
sufficient.  Of  one  thing  only  we  can  be  sure,  that  the 
faith  which  the  disciples  needed  for  their  task  came  to 
them  ;  and  if  we  find  God  at  all  in  historj',  least  of  all 
we  shall  refuse  to  find  him  here.  Only  it  is  not  upon 
this  that  we  can  rest  our  own  faith,  if  we  would  rest  it 
securely  ;  it  is  after  all  only  an  objective  fact,  a  fact  of 
history,  and  such  a  fact  always  will  be  open  to  the 
possibility  of  doubt.  Jesus  for  men  to-day  has  brought 
life  and  immortality  to  light,  but  it  is  because  he  has 
revealed  to  us  the  real  meaning  of  life,  and  has  shown 
us  that  in  its  very  nature  it  is  divine  and  eternal. 


APPENDIX. 

AN  ATTEMPT  TO    RECONSTRUCT   THE    COMMON   SOURCE 
USED   BY   THE  WRITERS   OF  THE  THREE   GOSPELS. 

I.     Matt.  3  :  1-12  (omitting  v.  4). 


I.  The  account  of  John  is  shown  to  have  been  in  the  source 
by  the  evident  relation  between  Matt,  and  Luke.  Just  how  it 
originally  opened  it  is  difficult  to  say.  Mk.'s  opening  sentence 
appears  from  the  word  EZa/yEXiov  to  be  due  to  himself.  The 
word  f.vayyiXiov  is  used  by  Mk.  only  in  a  technical  and  theo- 
logical sense  (Mk.  1:15,  in  connection  with  belief;  8:35; 
ID  :  29 ;  13  :  10  ;  14  :  9),  and  is  so  used  nowhere  else  in  the 
Synoptics,  except  where  it  is  taken  from  Mk.  (Matt.  26  :  13). 
In  the  source  it  probably  was  used  once  in  the  sense  of  "glad 
tidings  "  (Matt.  4  :  23,  cf.   9  :  35).      7I7?  ''lovdaiai  may  be   an 

Note.  In  the  following  pages  I  have  presupposed  the  work 
of  Professor  Weiss,  to  whom  I  hardly  need  to  acknowledge  my 
indebtedness.  I  am  convinced  that  he  has  discovered  the  truth 
about  the  Gospel  relations  so  far  as  his  general  theory  goes. 
Barring  points  of  detail,  I  differ  from  him  only  in  the  belief 
that  Mark  made  a  far  greater  use  of  the  source  than  he  would 
allow.  When  this  is  granted  I  think  that  a  great  many  things 
will  be  explained,  which  cannot  be  explained  otherwise ;  in  fact  I 
believe  that  there  is  no  phenomenon  in  the  Gospel  which  will  not 
find  a  natural  explanation.  Especially  I  call  attention  to  the 
way  in  which  the  sayings  of  Jesus  are  disposed  of  in  the  follow- 
ing pages,  a  good  test  of  the  theory.  I  have  made  no  attempt  to 
restore  the  order  of  the  source  except   in  isolated  cases,  and  do 

not  think  that  such  a  restoration  is  possible. 
22 

337 


^TfS  Appendix. 

2.  Mk,  I  :  9-1 1. 

3.  Matt.  4  :  i-ii. 

4.  Matt.  4  :  23-5  :  2. 


addition  by  Matt.  The  phrase  /.uravt  eIte,  r/yyixEv  yap  if 
/3a6i^£ia  riSv  ovpav gjv,  is  better  attributed  to  John,  than, 
as  in  Mk.  (i  :  15)  to  Jesus  ;  for  John's  was  more  particularly  a 
preaching  of  repentance  and  of  preparation.  The  picturesque 
description  of  John  (v.  4)  is  probably  due  to  Mk.  Matt,  brings 
it  in  here  because  Mk.'s  order  is  no  longer  natural  when  the 
verses  which  Mk.  omits  are  retained  (Matt.  3  '.^ff.).  'H  itEpi- 
Xoopoi  Tov  ^lopddvov,  omitted  by  Mk.  is  shown  to  have  been 
in  the  source  by  its  presence  in  Luke  (3  :  3).  The  reference  to 
the  Pharisees  and  Sadducees  is  apparently  due  to  the  first  Evan- 
gelist. Mk.  adds  the  prophecy  from  Malachi.  He  changes  the 
direct  address  to /?a7rrz(3;/ar  fteravoiai  eH  acpE6iv  djuapricSv, 
in  which  he  is  followed  bj-  Luke.  He  omits  most  of  John's 
■words,  changes  the  order  of  the  clauses  which  he  does  give, 
probably  changes  rd  vnodrji-iara  fta6Td6ixi  to  uvrpai  Xvdat 
Tov  iiidvra  tcSv  vnodrjuaToov  cxvtov,  and  omits  xal  nvpi, 
the  special  motive  for  which  disappears  with  the  omission  of 
Matt.  3  :  10. 

2.  As  the  question  of  John  and  the  answer  of  Jesus  are 
unknown  to  the  other  Evangelists,  the  incident  is  probably 
added  by  Matt,  as  an  attempt  to  account  for  the  fact  of  the 
baptism.  The  agreement  of  Matt,  and  Luke  shows  that  dvoiyoa 
was  used  in  the  source,  instead  of  Mk.'s  dxitoo. 

3.  'Ayiav  TtoXiv  for  'ispodoXvjua  is  probably  due  to  Matt. 
Mk.,  followed  by  Luke,  makes  the  temptation  continue 
through  the  forty  days,  but  loses  the  motive  for  this  statement 
of  time  by  his  omission  of  the  hunger  and  consequent  temp- 
tation. 

4.  Seep.  61.  Matt,  follows  Mk.  (4  :  17-22),  and  then  goes  back 
to  follow  the  source.  Perhaps  this  section  opened,  as  in  Mk., 
by  a  reference  to  John's  imprisonment.  Luke  condenses  the 
introduction  to  the  source  (4  :  14-15),  and  then  opens  his  account 
of  the  ministry  with  a  narrative  of  his  own.  He  then  takes 
up  Mk.,  only  omitting  the  call  of  the  disciples,  which  he  brings 
in  in  a  different  form  at  the  close  of  Mk.'s  account  of  the  first 


Appendix.  339 

5.  Luke  6:20b,  21;  Matt.  5:11-12,  14-48  (omitting  vv. 
25,  26,  31,  32);  6:  1-6,  16-18;  7:  1-5,  12;  Luke  6:43-45; 
Matt.   7:21,  24-29. 

6.  Matt.  8  : 1-4. 


day.  It  seems  better  to  retain  Matt.'s  phrase  7  ftadikEia  rwv 
ovpavcAv ,  rather  than  Mk.'s  rov  Oeov.  See  p.  218.  Once  how- 
ever row  Geoi;  occurs  in  the  source  (Matt.  12  :  28,  cf.  ev  nvevfiari 
Qeov),  and  Mk.  may  have  got  his  phrase  here. 

5.  Luke's  woes  are  probably  due  to  his  own  point  of  view 
on  the  question  of  wealth,  and  it  might  be  that,  for  the  same 
reason,  he  has,  in  the  beatitudes,  changed  what  originally  was 
spiritualized.  I  take  the  opposite  view  however.  Seep.  211.  For 
the  sermon  as  a  whole  see  p.  211/".     For  Matt.  5  :  25,  26,  see  33. 

For  Matt.  5  :  31-32,  see  45.  It  is  inappropriate  here,  as  Jesus 
is  laying  down  principles  and  not  rules.  Luke  omits  the  early 
part  of  the  sermon  as  having  too  special  a  reference  to  Jewish 
customs.  He  begins  abruptly  with  the  formula,  dXXd  v/.iiv 
Xeyoo  ro?5  OLKovovdir  {cf.  Matt.'s  7/H0i;'(jarre),  and  mixes  up  the 
sayings  about  retaliation  and  love  to  enemies.  He  then  omits 
Matt.  6  :  1-6,  16-18,  for  the  same  reason  as  above.  Matt,  gathers 
together  various  passages  on  prayer.  For  6  : 9-13,  see  25  ; 
6  :  14-15,  see  42.  Matt.  6  :  7-8  is  probably  due  to  oral  tradition. 
Another  long  insertion  occurs  Matt.  6  :  19-34.  For  vv.  19-21, 
25-33,  see  30,  (v.  34  is  probably  a  current  proverb  added  by 
Matt.);  vv.  22-23,  see  27  :  v.  24,  see  41.  Luke  paraphrases 
the  sayings  about  the  mote  and  beam  very  freely,  and  inserts 
two  sayings  (6  :  39-40)  for  which  see  19  and  29.  For  Matt.  7  :  7-1 1, 
see  25  ;  7  :  13-14,  21-23  ;  8  :  11-12,  see  35.  Matt.  7  :  19  is  taken 
from  the  words  of  John  (Matt.  3  :  10).  Matt.  7  :  6  is  probably 
due  to  oral  tradition.  Perhaps  7  :  15b  is  a  popular  proverb. 
6  ayaBoi  avdpooTtoi  .  .  .  to  drojiia  avrov  is  inverted  by 
Matt.,  and  put  in  another  connection  (12  :  35). 

6.  The  presence  of  this  narrative  in  the  source  is  indicated 
by  the  fact  that  Matt,  brings  it  in  immediately  after  the  Sermon 
(probably  its  original  position),  instead  of  following  Mark  ; 
and  also  by  slight  points  of  contact  between  Matt,  and  Luke. 
See  iSov,  Kx'<pie,  and  the  omission  of  Mk.'s  picturesque 
touches  dnAcxyx^^^^^^^  and  kufipiiui]6a)j.Evoi  aurcp. 


340  Appendix. 


7- 

Matt.  8:5-13  (omitting  vv.  11,  12). 

8. 

Matt.  9  :  18-26. 

9- 

Matt.  11  :  2-19  (omitting  vv,  14,  15). 

10. 

Matt.  II  :  20-24. 

II. 

Matt.  II  :  25-30. 

12. 

Luke  10:  23-24. 

7.  Luke  also  places  this  after  the  Sermon,  but  alters  it  very 
materially.  Matt,  now  takes  up  Mark  again  for  a  few  verses 
(8  :  14-16),  losing  of  course  the  connection  of  this  passage  with 
Mk.  1 :  16-28. 

8.  As  Luke  follows  the  account  of  the  centurion's  son  with 
the  raising  of  the  widow's  son  at  Nain,  this  may  have  been  the 
original  position  of  the  raising  of  the  dead  which  was  in  the 
source.  Luke  has  one  point  of  contact  with  Matt,  in  the  use 
of  T{pa6TtE?>ov.  The  narrative  Matt.  9:27-31,  is  probably  a 
combination  by  Matthew  of  the  stories  of  blind  Bartimteus, 
and  of  the  blind  man  in  the  eighth  chapter  of  Mark.  The 
use  of  the  epithet  vik  JaveiS,  here  without  any  connection 
with  the  rest  of  the  narrative,  is  in  Mark  met  by  a  protest  from 
the  people,  and  seems  to  be  connected  with  Mark's  view  of 
Jesus'  Messiabship.  In  Matthew  the  7tpo67}A.0av  avrcp  oi  rvfpXoi 
(c/.  Mk.'s  ^XBev  Ttpoi  zov  'lr;6ovv)  comes  in  abruptly  and  with- 
out explanation.  Jesus  is  made  to  disregard  the  entreaties  of 
*he  man  and  to  let  them  follow  without  notice,  till  he  comes  to 
the  house.  "Why  should  he  do  this  if  he  meant  to  heal  them  ? 
The  touching  of  the  eyes,  on  the  other  hand,  and  the  command 
to  tell  no  one,  without  however  the  preliminary  precautions 
which  would  make  this  prohibition  of  any  use,  come  from  the 
story  in  the  eighth  chapter.  This  would  explain  the  presence 
of  two  blind  men  in  the  story,  a  number  which  Matthew  retains 
when  he  comes  to  the  story  of  Bartimaeus.  Matthew  makes 
this  combination  simply  to  get  a  story  for  his  list  of  miracles. 
C/.  his  mutilation  of  another  narrative  in  the  following  section 
(9:32-34). 

9.  As  Luke  brings  in  here  the  discourse  about  John,  we  may 
perhaps  assume  that  this  was  the  original  position.  Matt,  in- 
troduces vv.  14,  15  from  Mk.  9  :  13. 

12.     I  put  this  here  on  the  authority  of  Luke.     Matthew  has 


Appendix.  341 

Matt.  13  :  3-9  ;  Mk.  4  :  26-29  ;    Matt.    13  :  31-33,  44-46 


13- 

Matt. 

13  :  3-9  ;  1 

51-52. 

14. 

Matt. 

8  :  19-22. 

15- 

Matt. 

8 : 23-27. 

16. 

Matt. 

8:28-34. 

17- 

Matt. 

9  : 1-8. 

18. 

Matt. 

14:13-21. 

19. 

Matt. 

15:1-14. 

interwoven  it  into  the  parable  discourse  (13  :  16-17),  but  this 
can  hardly  be  its  place,  for  it  makes  the  verb  refer  in  the  first 
sentence  to  spiritual,  and  in  the  second  to  physical  vision. 

13.  See  p.  203.  This  section,  which  seems  in  the  source  to 
have  been  a  parable  discourse,  is  somewhat  difficult  to  restore 
with  certainty.  I  have  given  the  introductory  remarks  about 
the  crowd  to  Mark,  because  this  is  a  favorite  touch  of  his,  and 
because  the  question  attached  to  the  last  parable,  dwrjuazs 
ravra  itavra,  appears  to  suggest  that  the  parables  were  spoken 
to  the  disciples. 

15.  I  put  this  incident  in  because  of  its  somewhat  simpler 
form  in  Matt.,  and  because  it  is  so  closely  connected  with  the 
next  following  one. 

17.  Luke  agrees  with  Matt,  in  uXivri,  v.  i8,  and  (pofiov^ 
v.  26. 

18.  The  connection  of  this  with  the  return  of  the  Twelve, 
and  the  notice  of  the  crowds  which  prevented  them  from  tak- 
ing rest,  are  probably  due  to  Mk.  Luke  has  a  few  points  of 
contact  with  Matt.  Y^ai  rovi  jpszay  sxovrai  OspaTteiai  idro, 
V.  II  ;  the  disciples'  answer,  given  as  in  Matt.,  with  a  para- 
phrase of  Mk.'s  addition  thrown  in  afterwards,  v.  13;  ro 
TtEpj66Ev6av  HXad/Licxrcov  Kocpivoi  SooSena,  \.  17.  The  story 
of  the  walking  on  the  sea  contains  no  clear  indication,  but  in 
my  opinion  is  due  to  Mark.  If  this  was  not  present  in  the 
source,  it  would  help  to  explain  why  Luke  omits  it. 

19.  This  appears  to  have  been  in  the  source  (i)  from  the 
saying  about  blind  guides,  which  Luke  also  has  retained  in  an 
impossible  connection  (6 :  39),  and  (2)  from  the  apparently 
more  original  character  of  Matt.  Thus  Mk.  on  account  of  an 
addition  which  he  makes,  repeats  the  reason  of  the  Pharisees' 


342  Appendix. 

20.  Matt.  15  :  21-22,  26-28. 

21.  Matt.  16  :  13-20. 

22.  Matt.  17: 1-9. 

23.  Matt.  17:  14-18. 

24.  Matt.  9  :  36-38  ;  y<al  npodnaXEdafxavoi  rov  ftaOT^rdi 
avrov  £7tE6TEtXEv  avrovi  ytal  naprjyyEiXEv  avroli  Xsyaov  ; 
Matt.  io:5b-i6;  Luke  10:16. 

attack  a  second  time  (7  :  2,  5)  ;  the  order  of  Jesus'  answer,  the 
ground  of  the  denunciation  preceding  the  denunciation  itself, 
seems  more  natural  in  Matt.  In  changing  this  order  Mk.  has 
to  insert  a  xal  eXeyev  avroii,  and  to  repeat  a  sentence  twice 
(7  : 8,  9).  Mk.  has  secondary  touches  not  present  in  Matt. 
Notice  KaXSi  in  v.  9,  apparently  suggested  by  the  much  more 
natural  xaXcji,  v.  6  ;  the  awkwardness  of  the  two  relative 
clauses  in  v.  11  ;  the  statement  ovxiri  dq)i  te  avrov  ov^kv 
itoiri6ai.  Mk.  introduces  explanatory  notes  for  gentile  readers, 
vv.  3,  II.  I  attribute  to  him  the  interpretation  of  the  parable, 
principally  because  the  other  interpretation  which  he  gives 
seems  certainly  to  belong  to  him,  and  because  the  style  of  the 
interpretation,  especially  the  list  of  sins,  savors  more  of  a 
Pauline  disciple  than  of  Jesus. 

20.  See  p.  168.  To  Mk.  is  probably  due  the  notice  of  Jesus' 
inability  to  remain  unknown,  the  words  dq)Ei  itpcSrov 
XopTa60rjvai  rd  vekvcx,  and  the  more  definite  description  of 
the  result  of  Jesus'  promise,  v.  30. 

21.  The  presence  of  rov  fiEov  in  Luke,  makes  probable 
Matt.'s  reading  in  v.  16.  On  account  of  the  parallelism  I  have 
retained  rov  viov  rov  dvOpcoTrov  {cf.  o  vidi  rov  Oeov)  in  v.  13. 
The  following  section  is  probably  due  entirely  to  Mk.  Notice 
the  different  use  of  litirjfxav  in  v.  30,  and  w.  32,  33  ;  see  p.  236. 

22.  The  discourse  about  Elias  is  omitted  by  Luke,  and  is 
probably  due  to  Mk. 

23.  See  p.  177.  Matt,  has  added  a  saying  from  the  source. 
See  42. 

24.  See  p.  224.  Mk.'s  report  of  this  discourse  is  evidently 
an  abstract  of  the  longer  version.  Matt,  follows  him  in  10  :  i. 
As  between  Matt,  and  Luke,  Matt,  as  usual  for  the  most  part 
keeps  closer  to  the  original.  The  words  inf^i-  dvo  ;(^zrfJ7'aS 
jurfdE  Cno57Jfiara  jut/Se  pd/3dov,  are  also  probably  an  addition 


Appendix.  343 

25.  Luke  II :  I  (omitting  first  clause);  Matt.  6:  9-13;  Luke 
11:5-8;  Matt.  7:  7-1 1. 

26.  Matt.  12:22-32. 

27.  Matt.  12:38-39;  Luke  11:30;  Matt.  12:41-45  (omit- 
ting the  last  sentence) ;  Matt.  6  :  22-23. 

28.  Matt.  23  :  13-28  ;  4  :  29-32,  34-39. 

from  Mk.  They  obscure  the  meaning,  for  the  agio's  yap  6 
kpyd.T7]'i  rfj'i  rpoqjTji  avrov  can  refer  only  to  the  taking  of 
bread  and  money.  Moreover  the  long  string  of  objects  makes 
the  sentence  clumsy.  Mk.  adds  these  picturesque  details,  and 
pictures  the  disciples  as  going  out  with  only  a  staff  of  all  the 
traveller's  ordinary  equipment,  an  idea  not  quite  correspond- 
ing with  the  prohibition  of  scrip  and  money  in  the  source,  but 
still  harmless  enough.  Matt.,  perhaps  without  looking  at  the 
passage  very  carefully,  remembered  that  a  staff  had  been  men- 
tioned, and  included  it  also  in  the  prohibition.  Luke's  version 
is  at  times  hardly  more  than  a  paraphrase.  The  opening  sec- 
tion he  omits,  probably  by  reason  of  its  reference  to  the  Samari- 
tans and  Gentiles,  but  portions  of  it  he  brings  in  later  (v.  9). 
To  obviate  the  clumsiness  which  results  from  this  omission, 
he  anticipates  the  simile  of  the  sheep  and  wolves.  V.  12  was 
probably  taken  originally  from  the  woes  against  the  Galilean 
cities,  and  accordingly  Luke  takes  this  occasion  to  bring  in 
that  discourse.  Matt,  as  usual  brings  together  a  number  of 
sayings  from  the  source.  Vv.  17-22,  see  29  and  Mk.  13:9-13; 
vv.  24-33,  see  29  ;  vv.  34-36,  see  32  ;  vv.  37-39,  see  39.  For  v.  42, 
cf.  Mk.  9  :  41.  V.  41  may  be  due  to  tradition.  For  Luke  10  : 
17-20,  see  p.  164. 

26.  Matt,  adds  rvtpXov.  This  probably  was  not  in  the  origi- 
nal account,  as  Luke  omits  it,  and  Matt,  himself  says,  "the 
dumb  man  both  spake  and  saw,"  whereas  we  naturally  should 
have  expected  "the  blind  and  dumb  man,"  or  else  "the  blind 
man,"  as  that  was  the  worse  affliction.  The  last  two  verses 
seem  to  be  modified  somewhat  in  phraseology  by  tradition. 
Matt.,  because  of  the  reference  to  blasphemy,  adds  verses  taken 
for  the  most  part  from  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  (vv.  33-35). 

27.  See  p.   199. 

28.  This  discourse  is  difficult  to  restore.  For  iutroduction 
see  p.  250.    V.  4  I  place  after  v.  28,  on  the  authority  of  Luke.    V. 


344  Appendix. 

29.  Luke  12  :  i  (to  np^rov)  ;  Matt.  10  :  26-33,  19-20,  24-25. 

30.  Luke  12  :  13-20  ;  Matt.  6  :  25-33,  19-21. 

31.  Matt.  25  :  1-12  ;  24  :  42-51. 

32.  Luke  12  :  49-50 ;  Malt.  10  :  34-36. 

33.  Luke  12  :  54-59- 

34.  Luke  13  : 1-9. 

33  is  due  to  Matt.,  as  is  shown  by  ytwiniara  extSv^v,  bor- 
rowed from  the  words  of  Johu.  If  this  arrangement  be  ap- 
proximately correct,  Luke's  version  may  be  tolerably  accounted 
for.  On  account  of  his  mistaken  interpretation  of  its  occasion, 
he  puts  the  saying  about  the  cup  and  platter  first.  Then  the 
other  sections  follow  in  the  same  relative  order  as  in  the  source, 
only  with  several  omitted  because  of  their  reference  to  matters 
specifically  Jewish.  Finally,  what  originally  was  the  opening 
paragraph,  displaced  by  the  saying  about  the  cup  and  platter, 
is  thrown  in  at  the  end.  For  ^  docpia  rov  Oeov  see  p.  306. 
Luke  is  often  manifestly  secondary.  See  11  :4i  ;  47-48,  where 
the  whole  point  is  missed  ;  49,  xai  6|  avrcSy,  where  a  statement 
as  to  w'hat  happened  to  others,  as  in  Matt.,  is  obviously  wanted  ; 
49,  a7to6roXuuS.     viov  Bapaxiov  is  probably  due  to  Matt. 

29.  The  saying  about  leaven  is  introduced  by  Luke  (notice 
Ttf)c^Tov)  simply  to  use  it  up  (as  is  also  v.  10).  By  making  the 
next  sentence  refer  back  to  vTtoxpi6tv,  an  entirely  wrong  sense 
is  given  to  it.  Notice  Luke's  EiitavE,  transferred  to  the  rela- 
tive clause,  and  so  obscuring  the  thought  {cf.  Matt.).  With 
this  saying  removed,  a  fairly  good  meaning  is  obtained  for  the 
introductory  remark.  It  is  the  sight  of  the  crowds  which  re- 
minds Jesus  of  the  future,  when  the  true  knowledge  of  the 
kingdom  will  be  given  to  the  world,  and  not  simply  to  a  little 
company.     For  the  remainder  see  p.  280/. 

30.  Luke  12  :  13-20  I  assign  to  the  source  because  it  seems  to 
be  authentic,  and  because  it  would  account  for  the  8id  zovto 
(Matt.  6 :  25). 

31.  See  p.  283/".  In  addition  cf.  the  knocking  of  the  master 
with  the  knocking  of  the  belated  virgins.  Luke  12  :  47-48  is 
most  likely  due  to  the  Evangelist,  for  o  (ipvyf.i6i  rtSv  odovroov 
naturally  brings  the  section  to  an  end. 

34.  Cf.  the  use  of  the  parable  by  Mk.  in  the  story  of  the 
barren  fig-tree. 


Appendix.  345 

35.  Matt.  7  :  13-14  ;  22  a  ;  Luke  13  :  26-27 ;  Matt.  8  :  1 1-12. 

36.  Matt.  12  : 1-13  (omitting  vv.  5-7,  12). 

37.  Luke  14  :8-i4. 

38.  Luke  14  :  16-24. 

39.  Luke  14  :  26  (omitting  eti  .  .  .  eavrov),  27;  Mk. 
8  :  35  (omitting  nal  rov  evayyF.Xiov)\  Luke  14  :  28-35. 

40.  Luke  15:1-2;  Mk.  2:17;  Matt.  18:12-13;  Luke 
15:8-10  (altered  to  correspond  to  preceding);  Matt. 
21  :  28-32. 

41.  Luke  16: 1-13. 

42.  Luke  17:  1-6;  Mk.  II  :  24  ;    Matt.  18: 21-34  ;  6  :  14-15. 

35.  Luke's  introduction  is  suspicious,  and  perhaps  suggested 
by  the  oXiyoi  ei6lv  oi  evpidHovrs?  avrrjv.  Luke  correctly 
makes  the  passage  refer  to  Jewish  contemporaries.  Luke,  in 
paraphrasing  the  passage  freely,  has  introduced  features  from 
the  parable  of  the  virgins  :  avtouXsi'd]^  njv  Qvpav ;  uvpie, 
avot^ov  7}jiiTv  ;  oiKoSedTtorrji.  His  representation  is  shown  to 
be  secondary  because  (i)  the  figure  of  the  oiHodeditori/i  has 
nothing  in  the  context  to  suggest  or  explain  it,  and  is  inconsist- 
ent with  V.  26^  V.  26  especially,  shows  that  Jesus  is  speaking 
of  himself,  as  he  does  in  Matt.'s  account ;  (2)  the  first  reply  of 
the  master,  ovh  oiSa  vjudi  ttoOev  idrs,  is  simply  an  anticipa- 
tion of  the  second,  and  so  must  be  dropped  out.  This  makes 
necessary  a  reconstruction  of  the  whole. 

36.  See  p.  238. 

37.  The  saying  vtai  6  vipoov  .  .  .  vrpooOTJdsTai,  which 
was  certainly  in  the  source,  gets  its  best  connection  here. 

38.  See  p.  204. 

39.  The  verse  o5  d^av  BeX'^  .  ,  .  doodei  avrrjv  probably 
belongs  here,  as  Matt,  and  Mk.  both  give  it  in  this  context,  and 
Luke's  err  re  ual  tjjv  xpvxf?y  eauroiJ seems  to  be  a  reminiscence 
of  it. 

40.  See  p.  300.  For  displacement  of  the  parable  of  the  two 
sons  by  the  parable  of  the  prodigal  son,  cf.  ri  8k  vjuiv  donei, 
Matt.  21  :  28  and  18  :  12.      For  the  conclusion  see  Luke  7  :  29-30. 

41.  V.  13  probably  belongs  here.  Luke's  version  may  in  parts 
be  a  free  one. 

42.  Luke  more  probably  has  the  original  form  of  the  saying 
about  prevailing  faith.     When  it  became  connected  with  the 


346  Appendix. 

43.  Luke  17  :  20-27  (omitting  v.  25) ;  Matt.  24  :  40-41  ;  Luke 

17:37- 

44.  Mk.     2  :  18  ;  Matt.  9:  15-17. 

45.  Mk.  10  :  2-10  ;  Luke  16:18;  Matt.  19  :  10-12. 

46.  Mk.  10  :  13-16. 

47.  Mk.  10:17-27;  Luke  18  :  28-30. 

48.  Matt.  20  :  i-i6. 

49.  Mk.  10  :  35-37  ;  Matt.  20  :  22-27  ;  Luke  22  :  27-30. 

50.  Matt.  21:1;  Mk.  11:2-3;  7-8;  Matt.  21:9;  Luke 
19:39-40,  45-46;  21:37-38. 

51.  Matt.  21  :  23-27. 

52.  Matt.  21  :  33-44  (omitting  43). 

story  of  the  barren  fig-tree,  the  sycamore  was  changed  to  a 
mountain.  The  verse  Mk.  11:  24  is  probably  corrupt  in  both 
Matt.'s  and  Mk.'s  version.  For  the  conclusion,  the  form  of 
Matt.  6  :  14-15  seems  most  original. 

43.  See  p.  292. 

44.  Luke  shows  a  slight  connection   with  Matt,  in    kxxv- 

45.  The  saying  Ttdi  6  (XTroXvoov  .  .  .  yUoz;|^«u£t  is  present 
in  Luke,  and  agrees  with  Matt,  in  the  last  clause  (Matt.  5  :32), 
and  in  having  a  participial  instead  of  a  relative  construction. 
/J?)  titi  TtoftVEi'a  seems  to  be  due  to  Matt.  In  general  Mk.  has 
retained  the  original  form. 

47.  Probably  in  the  source.  vSee  rfirjuaro'i ;  omission  of  ixr] 
dno6T(.pi)6T;)i  and  7)ydn7)6Ev  avrov  ;  TtoXAanXadiova,  and  in 
general  the  concluding  verses.    For  Matt.  19  :  28  see  49. 

49.  Matt,  has  ^  itijnjp  toov  viooi'  ZefiESaiov,  perhaps  to  save 
the  credit  of  the  Apostles.  But  in  Jesus'  answer  the  plu.  is  re- 
tained, 5  aireldds.  Notice  that  the  ri  dsXsii  does  not  come  in 
naturally  after  Matt.'s  airov6c\  n,  an  indication  that  his  text  is 
secondary. 

50.  Mk.  II  :  5-6  is  omitted  by  Matt.,  and  it  strikes  me  as  one 
of  Mk.'s  additions.  Similarly  Mk.  11  :  15  b,  16.  The  omission 
by  Matt,  of  dyopdZ^ovraZ  at  any  rate  seems  an  improvement. 

51.  Luke  has  slight  points  of  agreement  with  Matt.  {8iSd6- 
xovtoS,  Hayoo}. 

52.  Luke  20  :  15a  agrees  with  Matt.,  and  both  add  nd?  6 
neGojy      .      .      .       \iKfxri6Ei   avrov    (at    least  in   WH.    text). 


Appendix.  347 


S3 

54 
55 
56 
57 
58 
59 


Matt.  22 :  15-22, 
Matt.  22  :  23-33. 
Matt.  22 :  35-40. 
Mk.  12:35-37. 
Mk.  13. 

Matt.  25 :  14-29. 
Matt.  25  :  31-46. 


The   historical   notice  in   Matt.    21 :  45,  46,   follows  Mk.,  but 
is  influenced  by  Matt.  21  :  26. 

53.  Just  what  historical  setting  this  series  of  narratives  had, 
or  whether  they  belong  together  at  all,  it  is  not  easy  to  say. 
Matt,  and  Luke  agree  in  having  itovr]fiiav  (Ttavovpyuxv)  for 
Mk.'s  VTtoKpidiv.  Moreover,  the  first  Siddduszi  in  Luke  may 
be  an  echo  of  a  version  like  Matt.'s.  Mk.  seems  to  be  less 
original  in  v.  14  (last  clause),  v.  15^,  i6a. 

54.  Matt,  seems  slightly  more  original  than  Mk.  in  22  :  25, 
26;  29,  TtXavddOe  on;  30,  h'  r^  dva6rd6£i ;  omission  of 
TtoXv    TiXav(x6BE,  and  perhaps  elsewhere. 

55.  Matt,  is  shown  to  be  original  by  the  fact  that  Luke  has 
made  use  of  the  narrative  in  the  parable  of  the  good  Samaritan, 
and  has  retained  vo/J-iKoi,  TtEipaQcov,  and  ^iSadxaXs. 

56.  The  actual  question  and  answer  in  Matt,  may  be  due  to 
the  TtiSi  Xeyovdtv  oi  ypai.tfiar£li. 

57.  Matt,  adds  xai  dvvzEXtiai  rov  alcSvoi,  v.  3  ;  perhaps 
firfdh  da/J/3droo,  v.  20.  Matt.  24  :  9-14,  is  a  free  paraphrase,  due 
to  the  fact  that  this  passage  already  has  been  used  by  Matt. 
(10 :  17-22).  In  V.  22,  Matt,  has  xoXofJojOjjdovrai  ai  t/jne'pai 
euEivai,  and  this  may  be  a  reminiscence  of  the  original  form. 
In  this  case  Mk.  must  have  changed  the  form  of  the  whole 
sentence  from  a  standpoint  after  the  event,  and  in  the  first 
clause  have  been  followed  by  Matt.  It  seems  more  likely, 
however,  that  Mk.'s  form  is  original.  EvOEoo'i{\.  29),  however, 
seems  to  be  a  survival  from  the  soiorce.  Luke  is  very  free, 
and  reveals  a  standpoint  to  which  the  fall  of  Jerusalem  is 
past.  He  is  much  more  definite  in  his  predictions  (vv.  20, 
24),  and  he  separates  the  catastrophe  from  the  parousia,  placing 
between  them  the  uaipoi  eBvcSv,  of  indefinite  extent. 

58.  Matt.  25  :  30,  is  very  likely  an  addition,  modelled  after 
similar  endings. 


348  Appe7idix. 

60.  Luke  22:  I,  2  (introduce  Iv  SdAqj  MparT/dcxvre'i) ;  Mk. 
14:10,  iia;  Matt.  26:i6-i8a  (to  Aeyei);  Mk.  14:14-15 
(from  Ttov);  Matt.  26  :  19. 

61.  Matt.  26  :  20,  26-30  (omitting  fH  dq>E6iv  djuapTi&v). 

62.  Matt.  26  :  31-35  (omitting  v.  32). 

63.  Matt.  26  :36,  39-41  a  (omitting  rcj  nerpcp). 

64.  Matt.  26  :  47-52,  56  b. 

65.  Matt.  26:57-59;  Mk.  14:56,  60-62  (through  eii-ti); 
Luke  22:69;  Mk.  14:63-65  (insert  ri'i  16tiv  6  nai'oai  6e); 
66-72  (omit  £H  Ssvzepov,  and  substitute  H<h  icsXOa^v  e%oo 
€HXav6ev  mxpoo's). 


60.  Some  section  of  this  sort  is  necessary  as  a  connecting 
link,  and  the  simpler  form  in  Matt,  (without  the  suggestion  of 
a  miracle),  seems  original.  See  also  evxaipiav  in  Matt,  and 
Luke.  The  opening  verse  I  take  from  Luke,  because  it  seems 
a  trifle  more  natural,  and  because  it  suits  better  the  dnd  rove 
of  Matt,  (though  of  course  this  may  itself  be  secondary).  Matt. 
26  :  2,  i8b,  I  take  as  a  free  reproduction  of  the  sense.  The 
original  form  seems  to  be  in  Mk. 

61.  The  prophecy  of  the  betrayal  may  possibly  belong  here. 
Notice,  however,  that  Luke  displaces  it,  and  throws  it  in  later, 
which  he  would  have  been  less  likely  to  do  if  he  had  had  both 
Mk.  and  the  source  against  him. 

62.  V.  32  has  a  poor  connection,  and  seems  to  be  due  to  Mk. 

63.  Luke's  account  is  much  the  shorter,  and  it  seems  rather 
less  likely  that  he  should  abbreviate  it,  than  that  Mk.,  as  he 
often  does,  should  enlarge  upon  it.  Moreover,  the  leaving 
behind  of  the  disciples  in  two  sections,  looks  a  little  artificial, 
especially  as  all  the  disciples  appear  to  be  present  when  Judas 
arrives,  although  Jesus  had  not  returned  to  the  larger  body  of 
them.  Notice  also,  that  Matt,  has  the  pin.  i6xv<iocrE,  though  he 
follows  Mk.  in  making  the  words  addressed  to  Peter  only. 

64.  This  is  only  a  guess.  Matt,  and  Luke  agree  in  putting 
two  sayings  in  Jesus'  mouth,  but  the  sayings  diff"er.  The  inci- 
dent of  the  sword  seems  in  Mk.  to  be  a  little  too  parenthetical, 
and  to  need  something  to  complete  it. 

65.  Mk.  14  :  57-59,  gives  me  the  impression  of  being  an 
insertion.     It,  moreover,  is  omitted  by  Luke.     Hard  tov  Osov 


Appendix.  349 

66.  Mk.  IS  :  1-41. 

67.  Matt.  27:57-60. 

68.  Matt.  28:  I  (omitting  first  clause);  Mk.  16:4-5;  Matt. 
28 : 5-7. 


TovZ,S)VTo'i,  in  Matt.,  seems  to  be  a  reminiscence  of  Matt. 
16:  16. 

66.  In  the  lack  of  positive  data,  I  do  not  venture  to  restore 
this  section,  but,  in  all  likelihood,  Mk.  has  amplified  it  more  or 
less. 

68.  The  incident  of  the  preparation  of  the  spices,  I  refer, 
with  some  hesitation,  to  Mk.,  cf.  60.  The  Ka^oj?  eitcev  is 
assigned  both  by  Matt,  and  Luke  to  the  resurrection,  and  not, 
as  by  Mk.,  to  the  meeting  in  Galilee,    cf.  62. 

Sections  of  the  Gospel  Narrative  due  to  the  writer  of  our 
First  Gospel. 

Matt.  I ;  2  ;  3  :  14-15  ;  4  :  13-16  ;  5  :  5>  7-9 ;  6  : 7,  8,  34  b  ;  7:6; 
8  :  17  ;  9 :  13  a  ;  10 :  41  ;  12  :  5-7,  17-21  ;  13  :  35-43,  47-50 ;  14  :  28-31 ; 
15  :  23-25  ;  17  :  24-27  ;  18  :  10,  15-17,  19-20 121:4,  5i  1O1  H)  14-16 ; 
23  : 2-3,  8-10,  33  ;  26  :  15,  25,  53  (?) ;  27  :  3-10,  19,  24-25,  51  b-53, 
62-66  ;  28  : 2-4,  9-20. 

Sections  of  the  Gospel  Narrative  due  to  the  writer  of  our 
Second  Gospel. 

Mk.  1 : 6,  16-39,  45  ;  2:2,  4,  13-15,  27  ;  3  : 3-4,  6,  9-21,  31-35  ; 
4:1,  10-20,  33-34;  5:3-6,  8-9,  18-20,  30-32,  35-37,  43;  6:1-6, 
13-33,  45-56  ;  7  :  3-4,  17-23,  31-37  ;  8  :  1-26,  31-33  ;  9  :  11-18,  20-26, 
28-41;  10:1,  32-34,  46-52;  11:12-14,  20-22;  12:32-34,  38-44; 
14:2-9,  13-14,  17-21,  33-34,  39-42,  48-49,  51-52. 

Sections  of  the  Gospel  Narrative  due  to  the  writer  of  our 
Third  Gospel. 

Luke  i;  2;  3:1-2,  10-15,  23-2S  ;  4:16-30;  5:1-9;  7:11-17, 
36-50;  8:1-3;  9:61-62;  10:17-20,25-42;  11:27-28;  13:10-17, 
31-33  ;  15  :  11-32  ;  16  :  19-31  ;  17  :  7-19  ;  18  : 1-14  ;  19  :  i-io,  41-44 ; 
22  :  31-38  ;  23  : 6-12,  27-31,  39-43  ;  24  :  13-53. 


350 


Appendix. 


Cases  in  which  Mark  has  borrowed  phrases  or  incidents  from 
the  Common  Source,  and  has  used  them  apart  from  their  origi- 
nal connection. 

Mk.  I  :  15,  (/  Matt.  3:2;  i  :  21,  </^  4  :  23  ;  \  -.22,  cf.  7  :  28-29  ; 
I  :  24,  cf.  8  :  29 ;  i  :  28,  cf.  4  :  24  ;  i  :  32,  34,  </".  4 :  24  ;  i  :  45,  and 
similar  passages,  cf  Luke  12:1;  2:15-16,  cf.  Luke  15:1-2; 
3  : 4,  (/.  Matt.  12:12;  3  : 7-8,  </".  4  :  25  ;  3  :  13,  ^.  5  :  i  ;  3 :  14-15, 
cf.  10  :  7-8  ;  3  :  21,  22,  cf.  12  :  22-24  ;  4 :  21,  ^  5  :  15  ;  4  :  22,  </! 
10  :  26  ;  4  :  24,  </.  7:2;  4  :  25,  (/.  25  :  29  ;  6  : 6  b,  (/".  4  :  23  ;  6  :  7  b, 
13,  cf.  10:8;  6:12,  cf  10:7;  6:14-16,  cf.  16:14;  6:34,  cf 
9:36  (?);  6:56,  cf.  9:21  ;  8  :ii-i2,  f/".   12:38;  8:33,  cf.  4:10; 

8  :  34.  35,  cf  10  :  38-39  ;  8  :  38,  cf.  10  :  33  ;  9:1,  c/^  24  :  34  ;  9  :  23, 
^.  Luke  17:6;  9  :  33-35,  cf.  Matt.  24  :  26  ;  9  :  37,  cf.  Luke  10 :  16 
and  Matt.  10  :  40  ;  9  :  40,  cf.  Matt.  12  :  30;  9  :  42,  (/  Luke  17:2; 

9  :  45-48,  </:  Matt.  5  :  29-30  ;  9:  50,  cf.  Luke  14  :  34-35  ;  10  :  31, 
cf.  Matt.  20  :  16  ;  10  :  38  b,  cf.  Luke  12  :  50  ;  \i  :  12  ff.  cf.  Luke 
I3:6_^. ;  11  :  22-23,  ^  Luke  17  : 5-6  ;  n  :  24-25,  ^.  Matt.  18  :  19, 
21  ff.\  12:38,  </.  Matt.  23;  14:21,  cf.  Luke  17:2;  14:28,^. 
Matt.  28  : 7. 


INDEX  TO  PASSAGES  IN  THE  GOSPELS. 


MATTHEW. 

PAGE 

i.-ii 32 

iii.    1-12 50 

iii-    13-17 195 

iv.    13 299 

iv.   23-v.  1 62 

v.-vii 211,  251 

V.  11-12 280 

V.  29 269 

V.  38-48 273 

V.  43 207 

vi.  22-23 200 

vi.   25-33 263 

vii.   22-23 161 

vii.    28-29 63 

viii.   5-13 169 

viii.    14-17 47 

viii.   21-22    270 

viii.  28-34 56 

ix.  1-8 56,   167 

ix.  10 45 

ix.  14 42 

ix.  14-17 257,  279 

ix.   18-26 57,  170 

ix.  27-34 172 

X.  sff .  .222 


PAGE 

X.    17-33 287 

X.  37 240 

X.  42 43 

xi.   2-6 156,  194 

xi.    10 208 

xi.    II 219 

xi.    12 301 

xi.   20-24 160 

xi.   25-30 241 

xii.    1-8 57,238,247 

xii.  9-13 57-  165 

xii.    12 42 

xii.   15-16 44 

xii.  22-32 152,  261,  303 

xii.   31 303 

xii.   38-42 159 

xii.   43-45 261 

xiii.   3-9 281 

xiii.  24-30 281 

xiii.   36-43 202 

xiii.  47-50 282 

xiv.    13 41 

xiv.    13-21 58,  150 

xiv.    22-27 146 

xiv.   28-33 146 

XV.    1-20 248 


351 


352       Index  to  Passages  in  the  Gospels. 


PACK 

XV.    21-2S 1 68 

xvi.   12 46 

xvi.    13-20. . . .220,  232,  236,  279 

xvii,   1-8 58 

xvii,   14-20 57,  171,  264 

xviii.   1-35 5iff. 

xviii.  12-13 201 

xviii.  19-20 264 

xix.   10-12 270 

xix.   16-26 269 

xix.  23-24 42 

xix.  28 221 

XX.  20-28 305 , 3 1 7 

xxi.  1-17   59,  14S,  227,  308 

xxi.  23-27 234,  309 

xxi.  33-46 204 

xxii.  i-r4 204,  304 

xxii.  23-33 295 

xxii.  34-46 48 

xxii.  41-46 234 

xxiii.  1-12 250 

xxiii.  13    220,  250,  301 

xxiii.  33 208 

xxiii.  34-39   306 

xxiv.  36-xxv.  13 283 

XXV.  14-30 281 

XXV.  31-46 294 

x.xvi.  6-13 314 

xxvi.  18    60 

xxvi.  21-24 315 

xxvi.  25 172 

xxvi.  26-29 3^6 

xxvi.  33-35 316 

xxvi.  36-46 60 

xxvi.  64 61,  235 

xxvi.  69-75 60 

xxvii.  3-10 172 

xxvii.  19 172 

xxvii.  24-25 172 


PAGR 

xxvii.  51 148 

xxvii.  51-53 146 

xxvii.  62-66 172 

xxviii.  1-5 147 

xxviii.  i-io 332 

xxviii.  16-20 32,  239 

MARK. 

i.  1-8 50 

i.  14-15 210 

i    14-39 62,  179 

i.  16-20 301 

ii.  1-12 56,  167 

ii.  14-17 300 

ii-  23-28 57 

iii.  1-6 57,   181 

iii.  7-19 62 

iii.  20-22 183 

iii.  22-30 152 

iii.  31-35 183 

iv.  10-20 202 

iv.  26-29 2S2 

V.  r-20 56 

V.  21-43 34.  57 

vi.  1-6 182 

vi.  13 155 

vi.  30-44 58,  150 

vii.  24-30 168 

vii.  31-37 17S 

viii.  14-21 46,  182 

viii    22-26.  . .    .    178 

viii.  32-33   279 

viii.  34-ix.  I 286 

ix.  2-8 58 

ix.  14-29   57.  177 

ix.  33-50   5iff,  180 

X.  17-19 242 

X.  46-52 178 

xi.  i-ir 59 


Index  to  Passages  in  the  Gospels.        35, 


PAGE 

xi.  12-14,  20-25 149 

xi.  23-25 54,  264 

xiii 286,  290 

xiii.  35-37 38 

xiv.   13-14 60 

xiv.  32-42 60 

xiv.  62 61 

xiv.  66-72 60 

LUKE. 

i.-ii 32 

iv.  14-15 64 

iv.  16-30 147.  162 

iv.  31-43 47 

iv.  32 39 

V.  i-il 147 

V.  15-16 45 

V.  17 40 

V.  29 45 

vi.  1-5 57 

vi.  6-11 57.  165 

vi.  12-20 64 

vi.  20-49 211 

vii.  i-io 173 

vii.  11-16 173 

vii.  18-23 156 

vii.  36-50 78 

viii.  40-56 34 

ix.  10-17 58,  150 

ix.  18 33 

ix.  28-36 58 

ix.  46-50 5iff- 

ix.  61-62 270 

x.  I 173 

X.  17-20 164 

X.  25-37 205 

xi.  14-23 152 

xi.  14-36 199 

xi.  37-39 ^75 


FACE 

xii.  I 280,  287 

xii.  32-48 283 

xii.  38 39 

xii.  41 39 

xii.  49-53 305 

xiii.  11-17 166 

xiii.   24-30 304 

xiii.   26 161 

xiii.   31-35 163 

xiv.  1-15    175 

xiv.  33 207 

XV.  3-7 201,  300 

XV.  11-32 205 

xvi.  14-31 205 

xvii.  l-io ...  52ff. 

xvii.  1 1-19 148 

xvii.  20-21 220 

xvii.  22-37 292 

xviii.  1-8 285 

xix.  11-27 204 

xix.  29-48 59 

xix.  33 40 

XX.  39-40 48 

xxii.  24-30 221,  312 

xxii.  35-36 312 

xxii.  39-46 60 

xxii.   51 146 

xxii.   54-62 60 

xxii.  63-65 313 

xxii.  69    61 

xxiii.  6-12 313 

xxiii.  36 40 

xxiii.  39-43 313 

xxiii.  45 40 

xxiv.   10 41 

xxiv.   50-53 32 


JOHN. 


1.  15-34- 


.79 


354        Judex  to  Passages  in  the  Gospels. 


PAGE 

i-  35-51 83 

ii.  i-ii 95 

ii.  13-22 88 

iv.  1-45 105 

iv.  46-54 72 

V.  1 86 

V.  2-iS   76 

vi.  1-24 88 


PACK 

vii.  45-49 91 

ix 97 

xi 99 

xii.    i-S 77 

xix.  31-37 91 

xix.  35 130 

XX 93 

xxi 132,  134 


Date  Due 

DE5    '52 

(|) 

s.f^iA.^t.Nfct: 


=.:^(j'^--. 


